Change
by Emmelie Cullen
Summary: "What is it you miss so much about being human?" Emmett asked her, ice collecting on the ends of his newly cold and vampiric fingers as he traced patterns in the snow. Rosalie took a deep breath of the frozen air around her, metaphoric for the frozen time loop she'd pulled him into. "Change." - A story exploring Emmett and Rosalie's early relationship and his transformation.
1. Breath of Life

I had every intention to stop writing after my last story, but this story was just knocking on the door to my mind and I had to write it!

Growing up with Twilight, I immediately was drawn to Rosalie's character. Maybe I saw myself in her in the way she was misunderstood and mistaken by the narrator's perspective, always an after thought or foot note - because she was beautiful she couldn't be anything else. I found that Rosalie's story was deep context to why she was all at once enchanted and repulsed by Bella's humanity and Edward's love for her.

I found that Rosalie's own experience of beauty was full of duplicity as a blessing and curse, and her own experience of physical love obviously couldn't have come out of nowhere given her past. I wanted to fill in the space and explain beyond surface level reasoning of a limited perspective narrator why Rosalie and Emmett's relationship looks like it does and how it got there in the first place.

Because I saw so much depth in Rosalie, I was always very frustrated at the way Stephenie Meyer treated Rosalie's character as shallow and one-dimensional, but from the limited perspectives of Bella and Edward (in Midnight Sun), I understood why she had to write her the way she did. With that said, the older I get the more I realized how modern Rosalie and Emmett's love story truly is and what all they would've had to navigate that wasn't really talked about in the 1930s, and still is just recently starting to be discussed.

I see how the characteristics of Rosalie and Emmett's relationship are easily accepted by Bella and Edward because of particularly Bella's limited perspective of Rosalie and Emmett's own lives and experiences. Even after Rosalie opened up to Bella in Eclipse, and in the outtakes Emmett explains his transformation and perspective of Rosalie, Bella's response is still very removed. However, I think Stephenie Meyer left this story open to get filled by our imaginations! She gave us so many golden lines to play with so I'm going to try to keep this as canon as possible, just fill in those gaps!

I've loved reading Emmett's transformation stories and his early relationship with Rosalie throughout my time on this site, and thank so many of them for inspiring me to finally write my own considering it's been toying in my mind for more than 10 years! It will begin with Emmett's transformation day and span through their early relationship.

Enjoy!

* * *

_**Breath of Life**_

_I was looking for a breath of life_  
_A little touch of heavenly light_  
_But all the choirs in my head sang no_  
_To get a dream of life again_  
_A little of vision of the start and the end_

_But all the choirs in my head sang no_

* * *

**Carlisle**_ – Spring, 1935_

I sat on the front porch next to Esme, with my arm around her shoulders as she read Emily Dickinson aloud.

Edward was on the porch swing, twisting together the stems of two wildflowers mindlessly listening.

It was a beautiful spring day, and with the sun high in the sky, we'd all stayed home today.

I watched the sun sparkle off Esme's gorgeous skin and found myself staring, enamored by her beauty.

"What is it?" She asked with a little smile, her gorgeous eyes on my face.

It had been a while since I'd seen her smile.

Rosalie had left two months ago, and Edward and I knew what she'd left to do.

She had a mission, a calling, and a _vengeance_.

I couldn't bring myself to tell Esme that Rosalie had left to kill her own killers, gutting our newly minted family and leaving us all a bit emptied inside.

The worst part was, after she'd called just two days ago to tell me she'd done it, by the sound of her voice, I didn't know if she'd ever return.

I knew that she'd gotten Edward to explain to her about the Volturi. If she wanted to end her existence, she now knew the means in which to do so…

It broke my heart to think of her and it crushed my soul to know how Esme missed her.

Rosalie represented the darkness and selfishness in what I did to Edward and Esme. I had changed them to be like me thus extending their existence for my own companionship and for my own loneliness.

I'd seen it as a waste to let her die as she had, dehumanized in the streets – and had changed her out of pity. But, Rosalie thought that if her body had been found, they would have gotten caught and the law would have dealt with them all. Their names would've been desecrated and their reputations forever would be that of sick murderers and rapists.

She was idealistic in this thought of course, as she later found out her attackers had paid the police force not to investigate her disappearance too extensively.

Her disappearance was eventually ruled as a suicide when Royce King II mysteriously discovered an unidentifiable body of a girl about Rosalie's age a few days afterward. The body was too badly disfigured to identify, but she had golden blonde hair and Royce had provided it just to appease Rosalie's parents. With perfect theatrics and preserving his good name, he spun an elaborate tale of Rosalie's madness and jealousy leading up to their wedding that had caused her to finally kill herself. Rosalie's parents hadn't asked too many questions. They were embarrassed to have a daughter that had "gone mad" with woman's troubles and they'd even cursed her for disgracing their family legacy with mental illness.

Everything the name Rosalie Hale had meant before had died with her. Her reputation had died with her. Rosalie Hale was no longer a lost symbol of beauty, grace, poise, and perfection.

She was forever a symbol of madness and shame.

It was like a second death when Rosalie read about it in the paper.

That's when Rosalie's plan for vengeance gained its legs.

I thought that perhaps if she was able to kill her own rapists and killers she would find peace in her immortality, but maybe she had found that after her vengeance her existence had become pointless.

My heart broke at this thought.

"Rosalie?" Edward asked aloud, but his tone was that of surprise and even concern, not a response to my thoughts.

He shot to his feet, looking out on the horizon, hanging around the column of the porch.

"Rosalie!" Esme stood excitedly, clutching the book of poems to her chest as she looked toward the point of Edward's gaze.

I as well followed his eyes to a sparkling glint that swiftly turned into the face of my prodigal daughter.

But, she wasn't alone.

"Oh my God…" Edward breathed and both his hands came to his mouth.

"What is she doing?!" Esme puzzled frantically.

"She's with a human!" Edward gasped, seeming overwhelmed by her frantic thoughts.

Edward's eyes seemed to dart over the pages of her thoughts visible only to him.

"She wants you to change him!" Edward bluntly betrayed her thoughts as she approached and my heart went dark.

"Oh, Carlisle..." Esme shook her head and my heart sank.

Never in a million years would I have even dreamt this scenario.

"Carlisle!" Rosalie shrieked, approaching with blinding speed – pushing her _maximum_ speed with adrenaline. "You have to help me!"

As she came up the porch, Edward opened the front door - hurrying us all inside. Edward and Esme's eyes flickered with wanton bloodlust as they passed in a whir, but Rosalie held him protectively and possessively, hissing at them to control themselves.

The man in Rosalie's arms was indisputably taking his dying breaths. His heart was struggling; blood was flowing like water out of the many gashes and bites on his body and down Rosalie's arms in grotesque streams.

Animal attack.

"It was a bear." Edward clarified the thoughts.

"Please Carlisle, you _have_ to save him." Rosalie pleaded with me.

"Rosalie…" I began, still in shock that she was standing in front of me – let alone in the midst of the scenario at hand.

"Change him, Carlisle…. For me!" Rosalie was intensely impatient as she made it into the kitchen with him.

"Rosalie, no way!" Edward accused, trying to keep his voice level. "You're asking a lot of him. We haven't been hunting in a week!"

"I'll do it _myself_ then!" Rosalie shrieked, pushing Edward back with earth-shattering force before collapsing to the kitchen floor with the mutilated and practically dismembered body of a dying man.

"Bite me." Edward seethed, removing himself from an Edward-shaped indention in the wall.

"I will _kill_ you, Edward." Rosalie growled, irrational rage in her eyes. "There's no time for this!"

"You are _quite_ the killer, Rosalie." Edward narrowed his eyes, no doubt referring to her latest digression and extended absence.

Rosalie bared her teeth in a way that suggested she was about to fight him as her body arched over the man's protectively, shielding him.

"Please, you two stop it…" Esme's begging voice came from behind me, her eyes tortured as she danced her gaze between her fighting children.

The dying man looked up at Rosalie with desperate brown eyes, marveling at her existence, but seeming to beg for the solace from pain and suffering that someone so beautiful should promise.

"It's going to be all right." Rosalie swore to him, though her voice shook a little in uncertainty.

"You can't…" Edward began.

"Just tell me how to do it then, Carlisle. I don't want to mess it up." Rosalie requested torturously, cutting him off.

I saw the glimmer of bloodlust in her eyes that she was conquering masterfully but not enough for something like this.

"Rosalie, wait." I cut her off and knelt with her over the man, working quickly, trying to see if there was any chance of survival through medicinal means.

It was just a sheer miracle he was in one piece. Well, sort of one piece.

At first glance, his injuries were intimidating, but I could work quickly.

"Edward…" I began, my voice dark. "Go get the morphine."

"Why?" He questioned.

I knew his question was not for my sake, but for Rosalie's as the two of them glared at one another.

She wouldn't budge. She was too pig headed.

None of us had time for that right now.

"Edward. Please." I changed my tone.

"There's not much time, and I'm going to do everything I can." I told them both, staying steady as I ripped open the man's bloody shirt to expose an array of lacerations.

_I am going to do everything I can to save him as a doctor first. _

This thought seemed to appease Edward and my words appeased Rosalie.

Edward stalked from the room, turning over his shoulder to glare at Rosalie in challenge once more.

The dying man gritted his teeth at my touch on his left side where a ghastly pattern of gashes that resembled tearing from teeth had begun to clot.

Rosalie had to look away for a second - closing her eyes to make sure he didn't see her instincts in her blackening irises.

Because he'd been on the ground, contaminating materials had entered the wound, and Esme had read the situation so she'd brought me a cleaning agent, some alcohol from under the sink.

I glanced at Rosalie now who knew what to expect and as he gasped at the pain of the alcohol on the wounds, she held him tight hushing him like he was just a nightmare ridden child.

"It's all right. You're going to be all right." Rosalie promised in a tone I'd never heard her use before.

I realized the primary motivation in her eyes was that she hated to see his pain. Her bloodlust was in control for the most part.

He'd been cut through and crushed like he'd been nothing more than a toy for a dog.

I couldn't help but think of Rosalie, and I was filled with a sadness I couldn't shake.

She'd been victim to a different kind of animal, but an animal all the same.

Edward returned to the room with the morphine, sympathizing with my preoccupation and putting his hand on my shoulder.

He didn't say anything. He didn't have to.

I stabbed a syringe into the man's left arm.

Edward brought me exactly the medical supplies I needed. Not only because he knew my thoughts, but because he'd been paying attention to medicinal studies.

The damage to the man in front of me was intimidating even being a doctor as long as I had, and my family tensed at the sight of all the blood.

I noticed Rosalie held her breath as she looked down at the man, trying not to frighten him with her expression.

"D-don't leave." He managed to say in a thick, raspy scratch before taking a pained gasp as I tended to the open wound at his ribs.

"I'm not going to leave you." Rosalie promised with a look in her eyes I could only describe as _wonder_.

My heart sank as I looked upon Rosalie's distressed features as she spoke shallow comforts to the man in her arms.

Astonishingly, he smiled at her, blood on his lips and a gash that could've taken his left eye clean out of his head. It was so ghastly that it made her clench her jaw, but she smiled back.

I realized I'd never seen her smile.

She was radiant.

Esme dropped to her knees beside Rosalie, looking over her face.

This is the first we'd seen of our prodigal daughter in two months and I studied Rosalie's face as if it had been years because she was a different person today than she'd ever been before.

"Put pressure here…" I told Esme, and Rosalie quickly ripped some of the hem of her dress to give to Esme to tie above my hands.

His stomach was torn into, his chest covered in gashes, and I knew immediately from the way his unmoving legs sprawled on the floor that his spine was broken.

This man's right arm was all but severed at the elbow and his left leg had been bitten all the way through, crushing his femur.

"Angel…" The man mumbled, his eyes rolling back as he lost consciousness.

"_No_. Stay with me." Rosalie begged, her hands coming to his face and his eyes eventually fluttered and focused on her once more.

"Carlisle, please." She said to me, not breaking eye contact with the man as her fingers traced over his cheek. "He can't die. He has to be okay. He has to be."

I saw the white of his bone under great missing chunks of skin and muscle. It was gruesome, but I couldn't help but picture Rosalie Hale's beaten and bruised body that cold night in Rochester….

I still wondered if I could've saved her, as a doctor, that night. If I'd found her just a _little_ sooner, I would've been able to save her. Her injuries would've been treatable and she would've recovered.

My pity clouded my judgment.

Not even a week ago on our phone call, she plainly voiced her resentment to me over what I'd done to her, and now she asked me to do it again to this unsuspecting man.

I was disgusted with myself and my selfishness, and knew God would judge me for my weakness...

My own need for companionship outweighed my knowledge of the temptations and darkness of this life.

Now, it was much more than my need for companionship. This time it was different… This was _playing God_, but on someone else's request.

Was it the right thing to do?

Edward, my Adam, what would he think of me as I spawned another?

After Rosalie, I had promised myself never again… Never again would I subject someone to this life.

If this man had _any_ chance, I wanted to preserve that option.

"Carlisle…" Edward stopped my thoughts, compassion on his face as he stood over us, his arms crossed over his chest.

"Rosalie, you know it's _natural_ for him to die…." Edward tried to reason with her. "He's…"

"Edward, for Christ's sake you self-righteous, arrogant _reptile_…" Rosalie growled in determination, absolutely losing the perfect composure and control she'd maintained for the entirety of her existence.

"You know he's _dying_, Carlisle!" Rosalie was impatient and panicking. "I'm doing it if you won't."

"Rosalie, you won't be able to live with yourself if you kill him…" Edward told her. "_When_ you kill him."

Edward changed his words and Rosalie snarled at him.

As I worked, Rosalie repositioned the man's head in her lap and a chill ran down my spine.

For the man to be losing consciousness, he made every effort to keep his eyes fixated on her face as he gasped through the bewildering pain.

She trailed her fingers over his cheek sweetly, ducking her head so her lips were at his neck with exaggerated slowness.

Rosalie was barely a newborn vampire herself; she couldn't do this.

As her lips slightly parted, the man's eyes rolled back in his head.

"Rosalie!" Edward read something that panicked him in her thoughts.

"Stop talking! I'm trying to focus!" Rosalie snarled at him, closing her eyes as tight as she gritted her teeth.

"No. You were thinking about…" Edward's eyes seemed to get ten shades darker at even the insinuation of blood.

Rosalie growled protectively.

Every muscle in my body was tensed, ready to swoop in.

"I just have to focus." She furrowed her brow, readying herself again.

No.

She didn't know what she was doing.

"Rosalie… I'm not going to let you do this." I began softly.

She let out a labored scream of sorts like she'd been lifting a heavy weight.

She covered her face with her hands, a tearless sob ripping through her throat.

"Carlisle, _please_…" Rosalie begged, her eyes wide and desperate. "Carlisle, he can't die... And, I can't do it myself… If you care about my happiness at all…"

"Rosalie, you know that's not fair to him." Edward shot her a threatening glance.

The man coughed up a fountain of blood as Rosalie held him. She hushed him in a hopeless attempt at comfort, wiping his mouth with the sleeve of her dress in a shockingly maternal gesture.

Control began to get harder for the others. Edward had to turn his head and look away with a grimace and Esme covered her mouth.

I worried about Edward. How long had it been since his last human?…

Four years?… Was that enough time?

Rosalie was still barely out from being a newborn at only two years of vampirism, but Rosalie gritted her teeth, remaining steadfast.

He only had a couple minutes - tops.

She brushed his sweaty, dark hair off his face and she tried to comfort him frantically.

"I'm not leaving you." She said soothingly, her voice sounding like honey.

He gasped, choking on the blood from what was no doubt was a collapsed lung.

I continued to work quickly, more quickly than I could in a hospital surrounded by other humans.

"Rosalie... If I can save him..." I asked her even though the likelihood was slim. "As a doctor…"

"Carlisle… I _chose_ my words carefully." Rosalie's eyes were on fire and her chin was low.

"I want you to _change_ him, not save him." Rosalie revealed darkly in a whisper that was filled with shame. "_For_ me."

I looked into Rosalie's tortured eyes willing them to be tortured no longer.

"You can't be serious." Edward protested my thoughts as well as Rosalie's I imagined. "You'd do this to him? Willingly? You hate this life and..."

"Leave us alone, Edward!" Rosalie growled. "This isn't your decision!"

Edward left the room and slammed the door behind him with such force it fell of the hinges.

The man in Rosalie's arms stared up at her with fighting eyes, trying to speak, but only able to cough up blood.

In an irrational attempt of comfort, Rosalie began humming a song I'd never heard of in my life.

I could sense the struggle with her bloodlust lacing itself in her thoughts of concern and worry. Her voice was strained as she fought against her instinct to kill him.

Rosalie looked deep into his eyes with a covenant promise that he wasn't going to die. He looked at her, fighting for her gaze with everything he had left.

She was trying to put him back together, but he was in a thousand different pieces, ripped all from each other. He was mangled and beyond repair.

But, I could do something.

I could.

This was his only hope. This was Rosalie's only hope.

"Do it." Esme said, her voice strong and confident.

I looked over at her, my heart heavy and troubled. Her eyes remained sure and cool.

"Carlisle..." She began again - my wife, my love, my Queen.

"Do it." She asserted. "For Rosalie."

I clenched my jaw.

Next, I would've taken his hand as I had done with Edward's, Esme's, and Rosalie's – but his hands were violently disfigured and bloody from the attack.

Instead, I put my hand on his rapidly rising and falling chest, saying a prayer and begging the Lord, God to be with his soul… and ours.

Esme knelt beside me and put her hand on my shoulder in support, comfort, and solidarity.

"Thank you." Rosalie breathed.

She looked up at me with grateful eyes, still stroking his hair in a sort of victory. I felt a pit in my stomach as I looked up and away.

"Flectere si nequeo superos, Acheronta movebo." I said into the sky for the fourth time.

_'If I cannot bend the will of heaven, I will move hell.'_


	2. My Boy Builds Coffins

Here's a second chapter. I'm using Florence and the Machine songs for the titles because they definitely inspired me and helped me find the voices of these characters.

I've explored what it was like for Esme, Edward, and Carlisle as onlookers to Rosalie's choice to change Emmett in this first segment, but we'll get into Rosalie's point of view in the second segment of this chapter.

Thank you so much for reading! Enjoy!

* * *

_**My Boy Builds Coffins**_

_My boy builds coffins and I think it's a shame  
That when each one's been made, he can't see it again  
He crafts every one with love and with care  
Then it's thrown in the ground, it just isn't fair_

_My boy builds coffins he makes them all day  
But it's not just for work and it isn't for play  
He's made one for himself  
One for me too  
One of these days he'll make one for you_

* * *

**Esme**_ – A Few Days Later_

"Rosalie, darling?" I said softly, announcing my presence in the room as I rounded the corner with Edward.

Rosalie's darkening eyes found mine, then she snarled when she saw Edward.

She sat on the kitchen floor, where just two days ago the pool of blood around her had been fresh and a human heart had struggled to beat in her arms.

Now, the blood had dried in macabre crimson clouds, the heart was strong and erratic, and a newborn vampire was suffering through transformation in her embrace.

I reveled in the new sound of this changing heart.

God, it was strong. What beautiful percussion.

"Go away." Rosalie sneered at Edward defensively, curving her body over the man in her arms.

"I didn't come to kill him, Rosalie, though he'd like that right about now." Edward grimaced at the thoughts.

At the mention, the man gasped and Rosalie held his shoulders down, hushing him.

"Kill me… Please." The man begged in a hoarse voice and through gritted teeth, his rust colored eyes finding the new people in the room to beg us. "_Please_."

"No. It's almost over." Rosalie's voice raised an octave as she sweetly and shallowly promised him serenity.

"D-don't go." His eyes met hers again and his quick breathing slowed slightly and he clenched his jaw to suppress the screaming he undoubtedly wanted to do.

"I'm not leaving you." Rosalie said strongly, totally confident in making this promise.

It warmed my soul.

As he writhed in her lap, I noticed that her dress was ripped and absolutely saturated with his blood. Her golden hair hung out of a loose braid messily, tendrils falling in her face. I'd never seen her so disheveled in my life - except a little over two years ago in Rochester, New York.

Rosalie's arms were around him as he convulsed in pain, and his knees pronated in anguish as his broken spine straightened and reversed the paralysis.

His head of raven-colored curls buried into the crook of her arm to find comfort in her cold skin. He was tortured and breathing heavily, and she longed to ease his pain.

As I looked upon he and Rosalie, I noticed how much had changed in two days. Despite the charring fire I remembered with all to much clarity, transformation was really such an exquisitely breathtaking process.

It absolutely amazed me that Carlisle had the control to complete such a task.

Our newest family member's torn skin had filled in and had lightened substantially to almost the same marble color as Rosalie's.

Even in pain, he was beautiful but in such a different way than Carlisle and Edward. Their faces were the envy of angels – something sharp, lithe, and stunning about their beauty.

This man's face was divinely handsome in a warm and lively way. He was lovely in the way a summer evening was lovely. If Carlisle and Edward could be compared to snow in the mountains, this man was Southern wisteria in the summer.

I would swear through transformation he'd gotten even taller than he already was when Rosalie brought him here, and I noticed that his face and body had filled out in a way that suggested he hadn't been well fed in his human life and transformation made up for making him into what he would have been.

Edward ignored the man's request to die, pursing his lips into a line as he searched Rosalie's thoughts.

They seemed to be having some sort of conversation.

I watched as Edward's face softened.

"He's doing well, Rosalie - I mean as well as you can during transformation - when he has something else to focus on." Edward nodded, entering his thoughts. "It helps when you've been talking to him."

Edward looked toward Rosalie as if he was trying to assure her for how she'd been talking to him and telling him stories of his new life this whole time.

She clenched her jaw in what appeared to be embarrassment at her vulnerability being outed this way.

"What's his name?" I asked softly.

I saw how comfortable Rosalie was with him and it had made me wonder if they'd known each other for years – a childhood sweetheart or a trusted friend from days gone by.

I wasn't in possession of Edward's gift so I couldn't see her thoughts, but I imagined that with the uncharacteristic trust and comfort of him to Rosalie, that he must've reminded her of something human inside of her. He seemed close to her and not just physically.

She had not been touched by _any_ of our family in two years, successfully avoiding hugs, pats on the back, and passing hints of support and affection.

But now, she sat with a man's upper body in her lap and her arms around him securely.

"I… I don't know." Rosalie furrowed her brow as if the question had caught her off guard. She brushed his wild black hair off his forehead, looking down on him with care and concern.

I swallowed as Edward shot me a look. He saw her thoughts, but his expression didn't reveal them to me.

Was he really _just_ a stranger?

"Why don't you ask him?" I suggested, kneeling tentatively beside Rosalie and the man.

She looked over to me, then to Edward as if looking for reassurance. She and Edward had another little mental conversation.

Edward nodded and raised an eyebrow which seemed to prompt Rosalie to open her mouth.

"My name is Rosalie." She spoke in a velvety voice seeming to be reserved for the man in her lap.

His eyes snapped to focus on her face as he panted through gnashed teeth, his chest rising and falling rapidly.

"What's your name?" She asked, pinning his arms by his side as sweetly as one could do such a labored task.

"It… burns…" He spoke with a voice with the power of a rushing river.

"I know…" She breathed with sadness deep in her eyes at his plight.

He arched his back high, letting a tortured half-stifled scream escape his lips as he fought against her and the pain.

"Shhh, it doesn't do any good to scream." She said in an angelic coo, but I noticed the pain in her eyes as she watched him suffer.

Her caring attentiveness made me see what a drastically different person she'd become in just a few short days. She seemed _present_. She seemed here in this moment with our family. With _him_.

"What's your name?" Rosalie asked again, and I heard Carlisle enter the room from a day working at the hospital and inconspicuously gathering some clothes to fit our newest housemate.

"E-Emmett." He managed, and she smiled a radiant smile down at him.

"It's almost over, _Emmett_." She stroked his raven curls from his forehead, then her fingers fixated at a curl at the nape of his neck.

There was a slight tug at the corner of her mouth as she was the first person to speak his name.

He brought a shaking hand to his throat as if he could claw it out and escape the pain. Rosalie softly redirected his hand, holding tight to his fingers.

"How is he faring?" Carlisle asked, unbuttoning his sleeves and pushing them up to his elbows.

He knelt beside me, kissing me on the cheek tenderly, but setting my soul on fire.

At the presence of Carlisle, Emmett immediately reacted negatively, curling away from him and gasping in pain.

As Carlisle reached out, Emmett flailed away from him the best he could.

"No!" Emmett fought, torture in his tone as he clutched to Rosalie desperately.

She let him.

I furrowed my brow, and we all looked over at Edward in confusion. He could illuminate the motivating thoughts of Emmett's odd behavior.

Rosalie tried to calm Emmett, hushing him like a nightmare ridden child.

"He thinks Carlisle is God." Edward was amused by this of course and I couldn't help but giggle.

Carlisle snorted humorlessly.

I covered my mouth to disguise it, but Rosalie had already seen Edward, Carlisle, and I.

Because Emmett was suffering, Rosalie couldn't join us in our amusement. Betrayal filled her eyes and she clenched her jaw.

Carlisle cleared his throat and we wiped every trace of humor off our faces.

"He thinks Carlisle's here to take Rosalie away." Edward mumbled as if he were trying to make amends with Rosalie by disclosing this information. "He's going to be tragically disappointed when he wakes up and realizes Rosalie _isn't_ an angel."

"Sometimes I really just want to rip your throat out." Rosalie narrowed her eyes, her arms tightening around Emmett as he writhed.

"I was just messing with you, Rosalie." Edward smiled a little, crossing his arms over his chest as he leaned against the doorframe, the door still splintered and off its hinges as it leaned against the wall.

"Well, I wasn't." Rosalie raised an eyebrow, but ultimately was good-humored now.

"I know." Edward chuckled.

Oh, how I'd missed their banter.

"It shouldn't be too much longer." Carlisle half-smiled to her. "Rosalie, why don't you get cleaned up?"

He looked over to her with her arms wound around Emmett as he gasped in pain again.

"God…" Emmett shut his eyes tight as he climbed Rosalie like a tree, burying his face in her neck to find solace in her icy skin.

Rosalie wouldn't look over at Carlisle as Emmett's cheek struggled to find solace her cold skin. Though it would be no real ease of the pain, nothing could be during transformation, he still found some small comfort in the temperature of her vampire skin if just for a fleeting moment.

Carlisle watched Rosalie carefully and protectively like only a father would. Outside of transformation, Emmett's embrace of her was inappropriate for company. Rosalie seemed to find nothing but innocence in it, trailing her cool hand across his burning cheek as his body curled around hers.

"I can't leave him, Carlisle." Rosalie said in barely a whisper, almost as if she was going to wake a sleeping child.

"Edward and I are going to move him, change him out of those bloody clothes, and get this room cleaned up." Carlisle said in almost an order, knowing that Rosalie needed a break.

Emmett's forehead pressed against Rosalie's long swan's neck as he let out a writhing scream. Her jaw clenched and she remained steadfast in her claim to not leave him.

"Rosalie…" Carlisle began to protest.

"You're going to live forever." Rosalie ignored Carlisle and said softly, speaking only to Emmett, cradling his head as she ignored the rest of us. "You'll always be young, never tired… You will be strong, and fast, and… beautiful."

These shallow comforts did little to ease his pain, but he didn't scream again, instead just dug his fingers into Rosalie's back. He struggled to breathe as he stifled his screams, but he clenched his teeth together to look up at her with an iron tether between their gazes.

"Rosalie…" Carlisle began.

He stepped forward, but wouldn't ever put his hands on her.

We all knew how she felt about that.

Then, something happened that made Carlisle pause.

"Live… forever…" Emmett processed Rosalie's words, panting them between pained noises from the back of his throat.

"Forever." Rosalie nodded with a little smile.

"With no more pain." Rosalie promised even though that hadn't been true entirely for her.

This life had been nothing but pain for her.

He stuttered over an inhale so it came out as a cry.

Rosalie held him tighter.

"You can swim deeper and farther than you could ever imagine. You can see through the darkness, hear birds singing from miles away, and sometimes, when the sunrise reflects on your skin, it can seem like heaven." Rosalie whispered more good things to him.

This small arrangement of words made Carlisle, Edward, and I all freeze for a moment and stare at her. Rosalie… our heavy leaden Rosalie had made a sort of peace with her existence as a vampire as she revealed such a beautiful perspective on such an insignificant effect of her immortality.

I smiled at Carlisle, who smiled right back. Rosalie could be happy. This…. This could save her.

"Rosalie…" I began again, putting my hand on her shoulder.

She flinched away as I imagined she would.

"Stop… Leave me… Just a few more minutes… Please." Rosalie looked up to Carlisle and I with pleading eyes full of desperation.

I put my hand in Carlisle's, lacing our fingers together.

He looked over at me with concern, but I nodded.

"We're going to gather up some things to clean up then we'll be back. Then, you need to hunt and get cleaned up."

"Okay." Rosalie accepted, looking up to us with big, open eyes.

I didn't know if she was serious and if she was really going to listen or that she said this to appease us.

Edward had already dismissed himself and Carlisle and I floated closely behind.

Just before Rosalie was out of our sight line, I saw her softly reposition herself so her cheek pressed into Emmett's bare chest. His chest rose and fell quickly, but she closed her eyes listening to his erratic heartbeat while it still held rhythm.

I understood that her desperation was because she realized in just a few hours, she'd never hear it again.

* * *

**Rosalie**

I sat, stone still in the chair by the fireplace. Though a fire wasn't burning, I stared into the ashes as I reveled in the sound of Emmett's last few heartbeats.

Edward was sitting across from me, reading Shakespeare to try and cleanse his mind of everyone else's thoughts. I knew mine most often annoyed him, but he did complain incessantly about Emmett's – thoughts during transformation weren't exactly fairytales and Edward had begun to endure enough of his agony.

Carlisle believed it would be less threatening for Emmett to wake up with just one other vampire in the room, to test the waters, so Carlisle had opted to be there when he woke up to explain everything to him, but we were to stand close by in case…

In case he was uncontrollably volatile.

Everyone thought that I'd be the best choice to be in there with him. He'd likely recognize me, so I should be in there with him when he woke.

However, I was vain and selfish and generally awful so when I returned from hunting and had been alone with my thoughts as I fixed up, I'd chickened out and made Carlisle do it - the next best person for the job.

I'd stared at Emmett's blood running off my skin and down the drain of my shower and I'd gotten overwhelmed. I couldn't be cognizant of why, but something deep inside of me had been triggered, like a flip of a switch and I withdrew. I had watched the last trace of his blood run off my body, and I'd started to cry tearless cries.

What had I done?

I was wringing my hands nervously and I could tell everyone's thoughts began to overwhelm Edward because he hadn't turned the page in quite a while.

Then, Emmett's heart stopped.

I realized with melancholy sentimentality that I'd never hear it again.

In a long moment of silence, Edward's eyes moved up from his page, and Esme stood from her chair, her hands clasped in front of her elatedly as she stood.

I didn't dare move. I didn't blink. I didn't breathe.

"He's awake." Esme said in barely a whisper and grinned happily.

I heard him jolt to sit up, taking a swift inhale.

"Emmett," Carlisle began softly and I heard him fly to the farthest wall of the room, his back making a crunch in the plaster.

Esme tensed up, no doubt imagining the destruction of a home we'd have to move out of now.

"He's looking for you." Edward told me quietly.

If I could blush, I would have, but I just relaxed the grip of my nervous hands, turning away shyly even though I knew Edward could intrude on my thoughts regardless.

"You should…" He began.

I clenched my jaw, turning away stubbornly and practicing my French grammar in my head to keep Edward out.

I knew I should go into the room, calm him down… I remembered how terrifying and overwhelming that first sensory overload was.

The first thirst…

"My name is Carlisle and I'll explain everything." Carlisle's voice was calm as he began the script I remembered with perfect clarity from my awakening.

"I'm dead." Emmett finally said in a thick, velvety voice that was painted with a rich Southern accent.

His voice was like a summer thunderstorm coated in molten chocolate.

It was the most charming thing to ever grace my ears.

I heard him move again, this time in obvious defensiveness and shock at the new sound of his own voice.

"Well, not exactly. We still exist on earth, but as… something supernatural." Carlisle said calmly.

"Why can I see every thread in your shirt?" Emmett interrupted this thought process, reminding me of just how easily distracted I was during the discovery of the heightened senses.

"I can taste the rain outside." He said, and I heard him move again.

It was disorienting.

"You will discover a lot about your new life is… _enhanced_." Carlisle chose his words and I heard his weight shift in response, defensive...

Carlisle should have this speech rehearsed by now.

Granted, I hadn't been so eager to learn or ask questions as Emmett seemed to be, so he was throwing Carlisle off.

I just knew I was cursed when I awoke.

I accepted it all as consequences of the curse…

I shuddered, remembering. I had remained in a catatonic shock for most of my first few months as a vampire.

I made sure Carlisle knew I acknowledged and resented that he had damned me.

"Roses…" Emmett said and my hand came to my collarbone. "And honey…"

Me. He caught my scent.

"I remember…" He seemed to try and piece it together as he took another deep breath.

Edward's eyes were staring holes in my head.

I didn't dare breathe.

"Emmett, you were dying, and the only way to save you was to change you…"

"So the angel?..." Emmett began, and I felt something human in my core begin to flutter.

"Rosalie saw you dying in the woods and brought you here to make you like her. To make you like us. My family and I... we're vampires, and..."

"_Rosalie_," Emmett repeated my name and I felt my arms and legs get heavy in an oddly nervous way.

The way my name sounded... Now, _that_… was the most charming thing I'd ever heard.

I felt a side of my mouth turn up breaking the icy cold I'd surrounded myself in. I found it amusing the part of the sentence he attached to was not that he was a vampire. He'd attached to my name.

I heard Emmett's weight shift dramatically fast and I worried.

A foul curse word I'd never heard spoken in my entire life came rattling from Emmett's mouth.

_Fuck._

I noticed my jaw hung open incredulously and a sound I hadn't heard in ages escaped my _own_ mouth.

I giggled like a little school girl.

My eyes darted down and I suppressed an amused smile.

I felt Edward's eyes on me and counted down from one hundred in French as I looked over at Esme's reaction.

Esme's face looked whiter than usual.

"You're thirsty." Carlisle explained to Emmett.

All humor was sucked out of the situation and I felt my venom run cold.

"You need blood." Carlisle tried to ease him into it.

I felt the change in the air. I didn't even have to see it. I could sense it.

I hated myself for doing this to him. There was no turning back now.

I closed my eyes as I woefully imagined it for the first time, the animalistic, predatory, and instinctually vicious in him beginning to take over.

Thinking of him like that terrified me in an anciently familiar way.

It was too much to focus on so I had to turn away and Esme noticed, taking a step toward me as I remembered what it was like to be human and feel nauseous and faint.

"Each of us has chosen to live our after-lives in a way we believe is virtuous. We feed on animals to forego human prey. We hope you will stay with us and make this same choice."

"I _need_ it." Emmett growled, ignoring Carlisle's soliloquy.

Edward shot me a look, and I hid behind my eyelashes.

"Rosalie…" Edward pressed in a way that suggested I take responsibility for what I'd done…

I immediately felt defensive, as if Edward were treating me like I'd brought a stray dog home and was seeing how long it would take before I'd admit I regretted it and couldn't handle it.

"There are others…" Emmett acknowledged that he sensed us in the other room, and I noticed something vicious in his voice.

Instinctually he felt threatened by the three other vampires he sensed that hadn't shown themselves.

"Rosalie, you need to go get him." Edward started again, but I was bolted to the chair.

I shook my head. I couldn't move.

"All right." Edward exhaled, standing from his own chair and walking slowly into the room.

"You are safe and no one wants to threaten you." Carlisle continued, sensing Edward approaching as Emmett did.

He didn't want Emmett turning on any of us as a paranoid newborn.

"Do you understand?" Carlisle asked. "Everyone is like family."

Emmett didn't respond, but I felt the thickness in the air. I also felt Esme's eyes heavy on me.

I stood from my seat, my legs feeling wobbly and weak.

As Edward opened the door, he didn't turn around to see if I was coming. He already knew I was a coward.

I stood right outside of the doorframe, where I could see Emmett from the shadow where I stood.

He took my breath away. Time stood still. The earth tilted on its axis.

Something in the air felt different. Something _was_ different.

For the first time in a long time, I felt… warm.

"This is Edward, my son." Carlisle put his hand on Edward's shoulder as he stepped forward to take Emmett hunting.

Emmett snarled which was something awful that rattled my bones to my core. I heard Carlisle explaining the concept of a coven and family to Emmett as he introduced Edward and explained to him about hunting.

Emmett stopped the hostility toward Edward but not with ease.

Emmett had been consumed by blood lust.

I didn't even recognize him.

My stomach dropped through the floor and I felt panic coursing through the venom in my veins.

His brilliant red eyes gave away his curse as they hunted the room conspicuously and I found myself shrinking back further into the shadows.

I watched his hands curl into fists as if in frustration, but he still brought his long fingers to his throat as if he could ease the thirst.

Blood was the only thing he could focus on now – the only thing that mattered, the only thing that _would_ matter for a long while.


	3. How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful

Here's a third chapter! Thank you so much for your kind words and reviews! I LOVE hearing your thoughts and appreciate your time sharing them with me.

I will be out of town for a week so I wanted to get as much out as possible for you to read through and I promise to update more as I return!

This chapter is in Emmett's perspective, so it was fun to write all wild and whatnot!

Thank you so much for reading! Enjoy!

* * *

_**How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful**_

_And meanwhile a man was falling from space_  
_And every day I wore your face_  
_Like an atmosphere around me_  
_The satellite beside me_  
_And meanwhile a man was falling from space_  
_As he hit the earth I left this place_  
_Let the atmosphere surround me_  
_The satellite beside me_

_What are we gonna do?_  
_We've opened the door, now it's all coming through_  
_Tell me you see it too_  
_We opened our eyes and it's changing the view_

* * *

**Emmett** \- _First Day as a Vampire_

I looked around and marveled as we raced through the forest.

"Focus Emmett." The God-like one reminded me from about forty feet behind me.

That was the thing. I _could_ focus. On all of it at once.

Electricity coursed through my veins and energy vibrated in every cell. I felt and registered the sheer strength in my body now that I had hunted for the very first time.

It was overwhelming getting used to heightened senses, but it was thrilling to imagine this was natural and instinctual to me in my new form now.

Would I ever get used to this?

My mind was so… _open_. I registered and remembered every minute sound for miles.

I heard the lithe one with rust colored hair laugh under his breath from beside me.

He was blindingly fast, and I was supposed to be following him, but I was strong so I caught his stride and ran right beside him just for the thrill of it.

The only way I could measure my speed was by the rapid scenery changes, because it didn't _feel_ like a speed my senses couldn't handle to be pushing my legs to run faster and faster and _faster._

I saw every single ant crawling up every single flower stem.

Edward bounded over the river in a half of a second with little more effort than it took to step over a twig. It was enough.

We could fly.

I looked over at Carlisle, and he encouraged me to jump before him with a little smile.

I realized they were watching me. They were corralling me like some sort of wild animal and not letting me out of sight.

"Why am I still so... _thirsty_?" I asked Edward after I joined him on the other side of the river.

I landed on the balls of my feet. It was too easy.

"That's how it is in the beginning." Carlisle answered.

The wind changed and I found myself laser focused now on a bear upstream.

I snarled, consumed with thirst and even though it felt wrong instinctually, I was just _so thirsty_ it would do…

In my prowl, I couldn't even begin to think of the poetry. Now, I was the predator and this bear was the prey.

As I approached, I could tell it was a _big_ bear.

Seeing me, it growled, standing up on its hind legs.

I was no longer Emmett McCarty, and my instincts took over. I toyed with the bear, fighting and playing with it to get it riled up.

Its weight was nothing to me. Its growl did nothing to deter me. Its teeth were barely feathers against my skin.

It swiped its paw at me as one of its brothers had done just days before.

Now, it was met with an entirely different result.

A metallic shriek tore through the air as the bear's claws didn't even scratch my iron skin.

I was indestructible now.

I smiled, though now it was more of a snarl of victory.

I was too thirsty to keep playing, and my teeth found his throat with perfect accuracy to allow the hot, wet liquid to satiate the burning thirst that now radiated through my entire body.

I drank with eagerness, my mind shutting off as not to distract me from my purpose as a predator.

Even with the size of that bear, it was bloodless and empty before I felt satisfied.

I tossed its carcass without a thought, and ran toward my next target just ahead in the clearing.

Just a little further, a group of elk.

My body tensed reacting as it realized now someone was behind me.

I was still hunting.

I whirled around and pinned Edward against a tree with my razor teeth bared at his neck.

There was no escaping me. I was too strong.

"Emmett stop. It's me. It's Edward." He tried to reason with me calmly.

I held him by his collarbone right where I wanted him and I heard a metallic tearing sound coming from Edward's shoulder.

A snarl so feral it couldn't have come from me tore through the air.

"Emmett. Focus." Carlisle's voice sounded like it was underwater from far behind me.

Venom pulsed in my veins and pooled in my mouth.

"You're not a monster." Carlisle reminded the person inside me that was deep down under this veil of my instinct of self-preservation and predation.

I struggled and fought, growling at Edward and Carlisle.

I closed my eyes trying to pull that person out and back to the forefront.

That's when I released my vice grip on Edward.

When I opened my eyes Edward was still standing in front of me, though now a few feet away but with his arms raised in surrender and openness to show me his vulnerability. He wasn't fighting me.

The elk had run and there was nothing but the three of us here in the aftermath of my outburst.

"You're all right." Carlisle began softly, testing me. "Your impulses right now are… hard to control."

I turned over my shoulder to look at Carlisle. I was confused. It was like there were multiple people existing inside the one shell of my body. The strongest part of me was something I didn't even recognize.

"It's okay." Carlisle looked back at me with wide eyes, forgiving and understanding.

I tried to calm the part of me that was roaring to get out, to fight, to win, to conquer, to destroy.

I wanted to be taken aback by how easy it would've been for me to kill Edward, but I couldn't. It was natural. It was instinctual.

I would've done it without a shred of remorse.

"You were hunting. There was no thought. Just instinct." Edward said, forgiveness but wariness in his tone.

Carlisle's gaze shifted over my shoulder with concern, and I followed his amber eyes to a house on the other side of the clearing.

There was a wide window in which I saw the reflection of a man with terrifying, vermillion eyes against pale white skin. He was impossibly tall and broad in a menacing, intimidating way. His shoulders were mountainous and his height cast an even longer shadow. His hair was black as sin and wild, knotted with dirt after a fight.

To match his brilliant colored eyes, blood ran down the sides of his mouth and down his neck in a horrifying war paint. The blood dripped and stained the front of his white shirt in a macabre pattern that made him look even more like a monster.

With everything else in black and white, the blood was grotesquely vibrant and the vermillion eyes revealed the predator like a scarlet letter.

I didn't recognize the man in that window until I realized when I moved my hand that the reflection reacted in the same way.

This was me.

Past the reflection of those red, hellish eyes was the golden halo of an angel staring down from her heaven.

She vanished, evaporating into thin air so it was easy to think I'd just imagined her.

"Wait." I breathed, being drawn toward the phantom in the window on a different kind of hunt.

The world rushed by me as I had my sights set up high. Out of habit, I would've run toward the stair case, but out of instinct, I jumped immediately to the side porch, practically ripping the door off its hinges when I'd just barely pulled it open.

A whir of air had been stirred to my right, but a woman with chocolate brown hair and round, warm amber eyes stared back at me right in my center sight line.

I'd never seen her before, but I knew her. She was there.

During the fire.

She was filled with just the slightest alarm in her golden eyes before she gave me a little testing smile.

"Hello," She said in a sing-songy voice that sounded like the combination of a choir of spring time birds.

I felt Edward and Carlisle on either side of me now, before Carlisle stepped in front of me to stand between me and this woman.

He was defensive, but not wanting to set anything off in me so he moved slowly.

I abandoned social graces as I looked toward the staircase.

At the top of the stairs was a decorative table with a vase of flowers. I noticed the petals on the flowers were lightly moving as if someone had just breezed by.

The angel was still here. It wasn't my imagination.

I was drawn like a magnet and I turned to take the first step, ascending…

"Emmett, this is Esme, my wife." Carlisle began, and my eyes snapped right back toward the woman in front of me that I'd forgotten to respond to.

I unwound and looked down at her hands as she rotated them slightly, palms up toward me to show me her vulnerability and openness.

"Hello." I responded in my new voice for my new body.

That's when I remembered I looked like a fright. My gaze shot down to the blood stains on my shirt before I wiped my mouth with my sleeve.

I felt every fiber on my skin.

"It just takes some practice." The woman offered a little smile, baring perfectly shining white teeth behind two full, plum colored lips.

I furrowed my brow.

"Hunting that is." She gestured toward my current state.

"Oh, well, I do suppose I could learn a few things about table manners."

Carlisle put his arm around her shoulder, kissing her cheek as they both throatily laughed in amusement.

Carlisle and Edward had been hunting too and they barely had a hair out of place.

"He was playing with his food." Edward offered, light humor in his tone. "Poetically an irritable grizzly."

"That'll do it!" Esme offered in a giggle, still seeming to test me with conversation.

Carlisle, Esme, and Edward watched me like a volcano that was about to erupt.

I understood their wariness after what I'd done in the clearing. I hadn't imagined being capable of something like that.

I swallowed nervously, letting my eyes dart toward the staircase.

I sensed her.

Roses… Honey… And something too exquisite for me to identify yet…

She was standing still.

I could feel it in the placement of the air around me.

"You probably want to get cleaned up." Carlisle suggested. "Down the hall on the left." He nodded in the opposite direction as the staircase.

He was nodding to a washroom. Not out back behind the house in a rusted basin…

"We guessed on your size, and if the style… it's not to your preference?…" Esme tested, her kindness and warmth making me wonder if it was true she was a vampire.

There was no way.

I noticed she extended a bundle of clothes to me with a nice pair of shoes on top.

These were new. I wondered how much these threads cost. A small fortune for sure!

It made my heart race. I'd never seen anything like this.

"Thank you ma'am." I offered, trying my hand at remembering sociability. "These'll suit just fine. That's awful kind of you."

When I held the clothes in my hands, I'd never felt anything so soft.

"Of course. We want you to feel welcome, dear." Esme smiled lightly, hugging to Carlisle's side.

The way she talked to me reminded me faintly of my mother when I was young.

I gave one long, lingering look up the staircase before I nodded and turned toward the directions God had given me.

The forest was one thing, but this palace was another. I marveled as I walked through the door to a wash room bigger than my entire house I'd grown up in. Maybe my house could've fit into it 10 times.

I realized then just how fuzzy that memory was to me - like I was looking through the end of a glass bottle. It wasn't nearly as clear as my new, enhanced sight.

Inside this enormous wash room, there was no water pump. There was no wash bin with water to be heated up on the stove.

There was a sink with running water. A bath tub, a shower - all of it.

I noticed a switch on the wall. Electricity.

My fingers flicked the switch. I didn't need the lights, but I just wanted to see them. I watched with wonder, the filaments in the bulbs and the way I could see the particles of dust in a beautiful dance in the air.

These people were fancy.

I swallowed as I found the man's reflection once more in the mirror on the wall over the sink.

I'd changed quite a bit. That'd take some getting used to.

My eyes darted down and away from the new vermillion orbs and the blood.

All of that blood.

My throat ached with a burn that reminded me of the hunt, but it was manageable enough I could focus back on reaching for the handle. I turned it as far to the left as it would go.

Water immediately exited the shower head in streams of confetti.

It was _clean_.

I put my fingers underneath, turning my hand this way and that as water collected on my skin.

Then, since I was alone, I indulged and put my head under the water, opening my mouth and letting the clean water rain on my tongue. I closed my eyes and smiled, letting it run over my lips and down my chin.

I took a deep swallow, tasting it all. It wasn't refreshing as water had once been, instead it was just… _clean_.

Minutes later, it was hot - scalding hot - but it didn't burn my skin. Steam rose off my hand like smoke emanating from the burn that was still smoldering in my body from days past.

I stripped down in this unfamiliar place, feeling like a wild animal brought inside to be tamed. I felt wildly uncomfortable in my own skin. Something was inside of me, clawing at my center wanting to rip out.

But, for now, I was _me_.

The second I stepped under the water, swirling clouds of red began to circle down the drain.

I ran my hands across my chest, my fingers rising and dipping in the grooves of now well-defined muscles. I sighed as I placed my hands on the wall, hanging my head so the water could run down my back.

This couldn't be real. How much time had passed since I'd run into that bear in the woods? A week? A year? 10 years?

So much had changed I still wasn't totally convinced this wasn't a transcendent afterlife.

Purgatory?

I knew Ma'd been praying for me, and with her and the Saints, I figured Purgatory wouldn't last too long and I'd see heaven and its angels again.

Well, _one_ angel in particular. I hadn't seen the angel since I'd woken up. Maybe it really was purgatory and I'd alway be left wanting, reaching, desiring…

Over my loud thoughts, I heard a shift of weight coming from upstairs and an opening door.

I tuned my hearing, raising my head from under the water to listen to the quiet whispers of two female voices.

Then, the radio clicked on and Benny Goodman drowned out any hope of hearing what the angel was saying to Esme.

She was still here.

I scrubbed my fingers through my hair like I could scrub out the fixation, then when the water stopped running red, I brought up each bottle of soap to my nose to smell its various fine perfumes.

I wondered again if I'd really died.

This was a heaven I once couldn't have even fathomed.

I'd never even been in a place with running water…

I thought of my littlest sister, Caroline, carrying a bucket of water bigger than she was up the path to our house every few afternoons. She balanced it on her head of red, wild curly hair while she picked up her bruised and scraped, skinny knees to step through the high grass.

The fuzzy picture in my mind faded just as quickly as it appeared and I tried to remember exactly what her laugh sounded like, but I couldn't.

I turned around a green, crystal bottle in my hands wondering if this was from some far off exotic city like Paris or New York or something.

A part of me wanted to maintain some tact, but I didn't use the soap sparingly. I doused myself in it and watched the bubbles collect.

I watched the rainbow in the soap bubbles, seeing colors I didn't even have a name for within the spectrum.

I grinned, watching the bubbles like a simple-minded child, before I washed them all away.

A song I didn't recognize as _Love Is Just Around The Corner_ by Bing Crosby played on the radio and I heard every breath, every strum, every hum, all of it.

Had I _ever _heard music before?

This was just magical.

The radio upstairs clicked off, but I heard Esme's voice as she sang the rest of the words without a worry in her breath; the sound changed in my ears so she must've been coming down the stairs.

I heard the lightest patter of a woman's shoes on the floor next to Esme, noticing the pattern of footsteps had to be two people.

I turned off the water quickly, and reached for a towel that was fluffier than any pillow I'd ever slept on. I held it against my face for the briefest of moments and sighed before I shook the water out of my hair and practically jumped into the clothes Carlisle and Esme got for me.

The pants were too short and barely covered my ankles, but I didn't even mind. These clothes were nicer than anything else I'd ever worn in my life. The slide of the fabric on my skin felt foreign and I thought maybe those could've been silk socks.

I reached for the shoes as I sat down in the middle of the floor to put them on.

These were definitely _new_ shoes.

I swallowed as I tied the laces with rushed eagerness. I'd never had a new pair of shoes in my life.

Childishly, I hopped up and spun around in a circle on the tile; the bottoms of the shoes were so smooth I couldn't resist.

I found my gaze in the mirror again, not recognizing myself. The physical change itself was a lot to process, but I never imagined I would be dressed like this.

I looked fancy. I wasn't some Joe. I could be one of those butter and egg men driving around in a red 1933 Chrysler CL Imperial Dual-Windshield Phaeton.

I was smooth.

The radio crackled to life and an old song I didn't recognize but knew I'd heard, began to float through the air as I opened the door.

Her scent overpowered the others's easily and I was enchanted, ready to finally meet my savior angel.

"No. I wanted to listen to FDR." Edward protested, changing the radio. "He's speaking on the New Deal."

"Oh, please?" I heard _her_ voice for the very first time with my vampire ears, and stopped in my tracks.

It was like I'd taken a bullet to my chest and I almost stumbled back.

I immediately got nervous, like some sort of school boy crumb.

"Edward, please." Esme protested in joint with the angel's voice but I barely heard her. I barely heard what was on the radio. "We could use some music around here."

He didn't argue any more and I heard him take a seat.

Even though I was filled to the brim with anxiousness, I was drawn to where she was like a moth to a flame.

"Emmett, we're in here, dear." Esme's voice called lightly. "Please join us."

Roses… Honey…

I felt the angel take an inhale from the very air I breathed, and I tried not to appear too hurried or rushed as I casually rounded that very last corner.

My red gaze searched for her instantly, though it didn't have to search. In some gravitational way, I was immediately drawn to her.

That's when our eyes _really_ met for the very first time. That's when I really saw her with true vampire vision for the very first time.

She was _exquisite, _and I'd thought she was beautiful _before. _

Without looking away from her eyes, the rest of my enhanced vision took in all the details about her at once, but details I'd never get tired of discovering over and over again.

Her golden hair was curled to flow down to the lower curve of her back like sunshine and was pinned back to showcase the most perfect face in all of existence. With perfect symmetry and proportion for her perfect features, it almost hurt to look at her in such an imperfect world, but I marveled all the same. I wanted to reach out and touch her, because I was afraid she was going to evaporate.

Her big, doe eyes were the color of the evening sun and framed by a fan of perfect black eyelashes.

She wore a smart silk afternoon dress the color of pink bubble gum that was belted at her impossibly tiny waist and had flowing sleeves like angel wings over her narrow shoulders. Her dress flowed around her statuesque hourglass figure and down to her ankles to show off a pair of beautiful t-strapped high heels that accentuated her ultra feminine physique.

Her lips were full and the same color as rose petals. The curve of her pillowy lips was divine.

I couldn't be caught staring at her mouth, even though I wanted to.

It was impolite.

She stood in front of me like an angel or an apparition, and I feared she'd disappear again all the same.

I still wasn't convinced she got to stay.

"Emmett, you remember Rosalie…" Carlisle suggested, but I barely heard him.

"Of course." I breathed.

A smile erupted on my face I could hardly control, taking over like the inevitable morning sun as I reached for her.

"Rosalie Hale." She offered in a voice that sounded like the breeze before a summer rainstorm.

The corner of her mouth turned up slightly as she hid her golden eyes behind her thick black eyelashes and turned away from me without offering me her hand.

Her dainty hands were covered with white gloves, gathered at her wrist with a little cuff.

Still she denied me.

Rejected, I clenched my fingers back into a loose fist, but tried not to make it obvious as my hand floated back down to my side untouched by the angel.

I still wasn't convinced she was real.

I had to touch her.

"Miss _Rosalie_…" I smiled, excited and childish and full of light as I played with her name on my tongue.

I leaned up against the side wall to try and act natural even though every one of my dead nerve endings had been fired up.

Instead of her hand, Rosalie offered me her eyes once more and I reveled in her gaze.

I read something in her eyes. Was she nervous too?

"Careful," Edward mumbled under his breath and I noticed the side wall was splintering from where I stood, giving it too much force with the palm of my hand so it gave under me.

Esme grimaced, but ultimately was good-humored at the destruction.

I worried she'd make me leave now.

I looked over at Carlisle as he chuckled; I was unable to understand.

"We haven't let on just how _much_ more you can do now that you're a vampire." Carlisle said lightly.

"Gee, I'm sorry." I mumbled, embarrassed as I stepped back from the crumbling wall's edge.

"It's all right." Esme smiled at me with authenticity. "You'll get used to your strength."

I felt my eyes flood with enthusiasm as I imagined this life of strength and speed and senses.

I could barely stand the thought of seeing Rosalie's face during this embarrassment, but I was drawn to look at her any way.

I'd never get used to looking at her.

It was a miracle every time.

She bit her perfect bottom lip, raising a perfectly arched eye brow slightly as she fought a smile.

I grinned back at her, not wanting her to fight her smile any more. I wanted to see it all - unbridled.

Undoubtedly she was forgetting I was the monster she'd seen earlier outside the window.

At least I hoped that was the case.

"And, we can repair the wall, but the most pressing issue is that we've got to get you some new trousers, honey." Esme giggled lightly, biting her bottom lip and looking at Carlisle.

"You're a bit taller than we thought." Carlisle reasoned with a little chuckle.

If I could've blushed, I would have as I stared down to the pants that barely came to my ankles.

I clenched my jaw, not loving looking like a crumb in front of this angel, but ultimately I was in good humor because I didn't get embarrassed that easy.

"Well, I appreciate it all the same." I chuckled, but got distracted by the way a rain drop was streaming down the aforementioned window.

I fixated on the element.

It reminded me of thirst, and my throat began to burn though I tried to latch on to Rosalie's eyes once more.

I couldn't. It was like I'd missed a rung on a ladder and I couldn't grab hold again. I was just falling.

"Emmett, I'm sure you have plenty of questions." Carlisle started, motioning for me to sit.

I couldn't. I was vibrating with pent up energy.

The thirst inside was distracting the better part of my mind now.

"I…" I tried to speak, but I couldn't focus on words.

All I thought about was blood. I needed it more than anything I'd ever needed.

"We're here to help you with all of it." Esme encouraged, but I couldn't look at her.

"Well, I…" My eyes darted toward the wide window that Rosalie had been standing at looking down on my hellishness earlier.

Instead of being repelled by the monster, I was seduced by it - longing to become it once more.

Anything she needed me to become had to wait. I was the monster again now. I no longer had any desire or want that didn't have to do with blood.

"Edward?" Rosalie's beautiful voice redirected toward him in concern, and Edward stood with a nod.

I thought I'd heard reticence and fear in her voice. Who could blame her? She'd just seen me from the window looking like the worst of nightmares, and now I was just going to become it again.

If I was a nightmare, she was the stuff of dreams. She was the best, purest, most brilliant person I'd ever known and I didn't even know her yet, truly. I imagined I did know her though, and I was enchanted to keep knowing her. I believed in her and the awe of her existence.

She could do anything.

I realized I was holding my breath, and took a shaky exhale out of habit.

That's when it returned fully, rearing its ugly head and claiming my thoughts and sound mind once again.

I was lost to blood lust, disappearing into the spring evening as Carlisle and Edward followed me with devotion.

I couldn't even think to look back as Rosalie's eyes followed me out the door.


	4. Hardest of Hearts

Here's a new extra-extended chapter after the long time away! Thank you so much for your kind words and reviews! I LOVE hearing your thoughts and appreciate your time sharing them with me.

Some notes from previous reviews though. I understand there were concerns about 1930s slang, and there were some words peppered in the previous chapter and will continue to be used but never in a way that impedes on readability! I will only use slang when I believe it enhances a character point or development not just for the sake of it. I also just find it much more realistic given Emmett's rural upbringing that he wouldn't be fully aware of "city-slicking" slang which were most popularly used in metropolitan areas. Also, Rosalie was in a proper, society upbringing that would've frowned on slang. Also, keep in mind the South has a slang of its own, and things are always slow to catch on there anyway so Emmett in the mid-thirties might not even be aware of slang until ten years after. There wouldn't be trend-setters or culture leaders in his immediate experience in the background I've given him in a very rural upbringing.

As far as his vocabulary, I admit I do tend to write inner dialogue a lot less "first person conversational" and more for the reader than the actual inner monologue of the character. I apologize if this took you out of a reading experience. I just didn't want his inner voice to be difficult to read in sequence with the other characters's POV chapters and sound like _Huckleberry Finn._ I write true thoughts and true dialogue with a lot more care toward true and realistic vocabulary and personality for the character, just for readability purposes I like to keep the setting details and character experience in a little bit more of an authorial/ uniform tone.

This chapter is in Rosalie's perspective again, so I think it will explain her thoughts a little better on Emmett and her experience of his attention. I found one of the biggest holes and missing discussions about Rosalie's character in the canon series to be her healing journey after her sexual assault. Bella and Edward had very limited perspectives on this as I mentioned in my first author's note, so I'm looking forward to really showing the depth of her character and her relationship with her vanity as well as how she and Emmett came to be. In a lot of readings I've done on the psychology of sexual assault survivors, the stereotype and dominant personality traits of Stephenie Meyer's Emmett is the exact opposite of who Rosalie would be comfortable around after her experience. However, I think it really allows for an exploration of depth into Emmett's own character and who he is to _Rosalie_ beyond what we see of him from Bella and Edward's perspective.

Thank you so much for reading! Enjoy!

* * *

_**Hardest of Hearts**_

_There is love in your body but you can't hold it in _

_It pours from your eyes and spills from your skin _

_Tenderest touch leaves the darkest of marks _

_And the kindest of kisses break the hardest of hearts_

_There is love in your body but you can't get it out _

_It gets stuck in your head, won't come out of your mouth _

_Sticks to your tongue and shows on your face _

_That the sweetest of words have the bitterest taste_

* * *

**Rosalie** \- _A month of impatience_

I didn't sleep anymore so there was really no functional need for a bed, but I wanted one in my room for aesthetic reasons, so of course Carlisle and Esme had obliged.

Also there was no place to ponder and pout as good as a bed. As I laid in the center of the bed, I stretched my feet up to the ceiling above me pointing my toes better than the greatest Russian ballerinas and reaching my limbs as long as they could stretch. I lethargically rolled my ankles in a circle, kicking my feet one after the other in slow patterns.

My arms extended from my shoulders palms toward the ceiling and I let my feet float down to the bed so I was in a long, extended star position.

I huffed, blowing a strand of hair off my face.

I was bored.

Time passed slowly and lazily like January molasses when he was gone - which was 95% of the time now.

He was never here and when he was, he was distracted.

"Rosalie? Can I come in?" Esme asked as she tapped her knuckles on the door.

I didn't answer, yet she opened the door anyway.

I didn't bother sitting up as she entered my room with conversation on her mind.

It wasn't difficult to see it in her face that she had something she wanted to talk about. I didn't need to be Edward or have his gift to sense this.

"How are you?" She asked.

I despised small talk when it was unnecessary. She'd come in with a purpose.

A heavy sigh escaped my lips.

"Lovely." I responded with one word. "What is it?"

I urged her onward into whatever she'd come in here to say. I was bored yes, but that didn't mean time could be wasted on small talk when it so clearly was a front for something else.

"I was just thinking about… Well, I know this is difficult." Esme said, impossible kindness in her voice.

"What is?" I asked, not entirely understanding her point, but knowing in some way she wanted to talk about Emmett.

"Well, I was on the newborn side of things once." Esme began wringing her hands, always tip toeing in conversation with me. "And… Carlisle had to be impossibly patient with me."

I clenched my jaw as I sat up cross legged in the center of my bed like a pouting child.

I didn't know what to say. I'm sure she saw it in my eyes that I was exhausted in an entirely new way. I'd never been one for understanding or patience, but that seemed to be all I could be these days.

I had to be understanding and patient. I had no other choice and I was learning this painfully.

I also didn't know what I was waiting for. I was impatient, and it was directed at Emmett, but I didn't quite know what I was waiting for.

What did I want from him?

"Speaking from my own experience, I wanted so badly to be able to be myself apart from the bloodlust, but that first year was so… confusing." Esme said, sitting down on the corner of my bed but keeping both her feet on the floor.

I swallowed, all at once not wanting to get into this but also wanting to open up to Esme for her own happiness.

But, I couldn't.

I couldn't.

"I saw Carlisle and it was evident how much he loved me… and I wanted to get to know him, to talk to him about my deepest fears, to learn his favorite songs, to hear his stories, go on long walks and look up at the stars, and… to really fall in love with him like… I normally would have. But, but I couldn't." She went on. "It was impossible to separate any desire from the desire for blood. But, but with time I got better at it. I understood that I could… want other things. I had to rely on Carlisle a lot to help me with that…"

I clenched my jaw, looking away from her and up at the ceiling, fixating.

Did I want Emmett to want me?

It was evident I didn't love him. I couldn't. He was a stranger to me, but I needed him in this life in one way or another.

Ever since he was cognizant and awake, I'd avoided him. I couldn't explain why other than one thing.

He terrified me.

He was obviously different than any other man that had ever laid eyes on me. He was another species entirely. I'd never encountered anything like him, but still… he was a man and I'd stay convinced I knew what that meant by my previous experiences.

"He's in there, Rosalie. Whoever it was you saw that made you want to change him in the first place. He's in there." Esme said strongly knowing I needed to be pushed.

Hearing this from her made my throat tighten so much I imagined it had totally constricted. I didn't like feeling left vulnerable, so my icy exterior just hardened as she hit a nerve.

"I know." I said coldly and moved over to start brushing my hair in front of my vanity.

I brushed out my perfect golden curls again and again.

I saw Esme standing in the mirror behind me waiting. She deserved someone much better than me. I was awful and cold to her, and I knew she didn't deserve that.

"Can I?" She asked, heartbroken anticipation in her eyes that she already assumed would get shot down.

She tried anyway.

I realized I'd never told her goodbye when I left for my vengeance tour. I'd disappeared in the night, and stayed gone for months without even the slightest explanation.

I'd broken her little family and her heart.

She'd shown me nothing but kindness, but I'd shown her nothing but distant distrust.

I didn't answer her outright, but I slowed my hand in my hair, unwrapping my fingers from the handle of the brush to make room for her own.

I couldn't help it that I stiffened under her affection as she now slowly and carefully brushed through my perfect, long golden hair.

"Your hair is so gorgeous." Esme marveled as so many had done before, but there was a glimmer in her eyes that suggested she was really marveling at what progress she perceived this to be in our relationship.

"Thank you." I smiled tightly, trying not to continue to accept awe-filled compliments as facts, though words had begun to lose the luster since everyone had been telling me I was beautiful since I could remember.

I'd even learned that sometimes people complimented me because they didn't know what else to say to me. They imagined nothing was going on in my head but my vanity, so they perceived a compliment as a connection point with me or just a way to fill silence when I was around.

I'd had just about enough of her brushing through my hair, but I let her continue all the same. I tried to relax the tension in my shoulders, but it was no use.

She finally read my discomfort, and slowed her brush strokes until she finally stopped.

"Carlisle called and said Emmett's turning out to be quite a swell fellow." Esme started to make conversation as I began to pin and fashion my hair away from my face.

I tried not to let her know I'd eavesdropped on their conversation already. I knew this.

Her fingers awkwardly interlaced as if she was trying to fight reaching out to help me with my hair once more.

I thought about what Edward and Carlisle knew about him. I wondered who he was. I wondered what Emmett thought about them, about all of this. About all of us.

About me.

I think I did wish he knew me as he had so quickly grown to know Edward and Carlisle.

Well, I don't know. Maybe he wouldn't have liked getting to know me. These past couple years had changed me, and in more ways than just my diet and sleep patterns.

Who was I now that I wasn't Rosalie Hale?

How could he know me if I didn't even know what that meant anymore?

I sighed, drifting from these toxic thoughts.

Edward and Emmett spent every moment together it seemed, and I grew concerned.

Selfishly, I wondered if they talked about me.

What would Edward say? Obviously not something kind. I hadn't been very kind to him to deserve it.

I pursed my lips sideways, biting the inside of my cheek.

Edward said he didn't mind to be Emmett's primary caretaker this past month though and I saw he had actually developed a sort of kinship with him.

This pleased Carlisle and Esme to no end, but I constantly caught them giving me odd looks as if they were just waiting for me to do something.

In the month since Emmett awoke as a vampire, I had spoken all of three words to him. I didn't know what to say. I didn't know how to start, and he didn't seem to know how to start with me either.

I assumed since he'd just spent five days in the Appalachian Mountains, he'd be so blood drunk he'd start to find some coherence when he got back.

At least that's what I think I hoped.

This waiting game had me itching with anticipation, but at the same time… it was safe.

Distance was safe.

"They should be back this afternoon." Esme seemed rejuvenated by this information.

She'd missed Carlisle.

This news made my stomach drop to my knees, but I remained cool as I decided on a pair of earrings to offset the jewel that is my perfect face.

"Is that so?" I remained detached.

"I know I'll be happy to see Carlisle." Esme smiled excitedly but she seemed to be pushing me to say I would be happy to see Emmett.

Was I?

I think so. Mostly, I was just impatient and nervous.

"What about that white organza dress?" She gestured toward a new dress in my closet she'd undoubtedly put there when she'd been hoping I'd return.

Little did she know the last time I'd put on a white organza to impress a man upon my mother figure's request, it got me killed.

I wore white organza to carry my father's 'forgotten' lunch to the bank, of course attracting the attention of the man my mother intended…

"No, I'm wearing the blue." I mumbled.

It was a beautiful dress, but there was not a chance in hell I was wearing white organza.

I couldn't risk it.

"You'd look beautiful in anything." Esme said, handing me the blue dress with a kind smile. "And the blue is a gorgeous dress too."

"I know." I swallowed, though my eyes lingered on that white organza dress hanging ominously in my closet.

It seemed to be taunting me, calling to me, telling me that this road I was going down, I'd gone down before…

And what kind of naive little child did I have to be to imagine Emmett'd want anything different from me, that this could end any differently?…

Still though… I hoped.

So, I wore the blue.

* * *

I was playing the piano when I heard he, Edward, and Carlisle in the forest.

I never wanted him to see me like that - like a predator - so I never accompanied hunting trips - who was I kidding, I was also terrified of seeing him as a predator. I was already terrified of him enough.

But through this terror of him came something different… I was intrigued.

I wanted to learn him like I learned a song, so much that it would become natural.

But, he was intensely tempted by blood, seeming to think only of it and nothing else. I remembered being a newborn, ruled by desire and animalistic instinct rather than humanity and rational thought.

Emmett seemed absolutely incapable of coherence these past few weeks and I was getting impatient, but then again I was glad. I almost wished I could stop time from moving because this distance was safe.

What was going to happen if we talked?

I watched him every moment I could, trying to pick up anything about who he was and what he was like, but mostly he was just nervous and thirsty – always moving and always vibrating with new energy.

He couldn't focus on who he was when we were so busy trying to tell him he wasn't what his most natural instinct told him he should be: a monster.

Emmett spent most of his time outside and with Edward and Carlisle. He'd snapped at them a few times for standing too close and startling him while hunting, his instincts ruling as he almost ripped Edward's arm off before gaining control again.

He was still too dangerous for Esme or I to spend extended amounts of time around him, and this brought back the fear in me, but I understood.

Edward revealed last time we talked that Emmett was starting to try to gain control of his thoughts and actions, but was failing miserably thus far. However, Edward tried to acknowledge the silver lining. It was immense progress just that he finally knew there was someone else inside him - not just the monster. There were human desires still left over, human qualities that could peek through the veil of vampirism if he let them.

He just didn't have the self-control to overcome this duality and suppress the part of him that wanted to murder an entire town.

_Yet_.

Apparently self-control wasn't something he brought from his human life. This was something Carlisle postulated that I had overheard. It terrified me, but also intrigued me.

What was that like?

I had always been perfectly put together, perfectly full of thoughtfulness and restraint.

What was that freedom like?

It drew me to him, but it also _repelled_ me.

I was all at once enchanted and absolutely disgusted by him.

Emmett was… _wild_ like some sort of animal.

He was boisterous and loud and untamed.

I was a tea cup, already chipped at the edge.

He'd just destroy me.

I wondered how much he remembered from the hell of transformation. Would that make him resent me?

I remembered some things here and there from my own, but it was all very segmented.

I hoped he didn't remember how I'd held him, how I'd touched his face, how I'd talked to him, and cared for him.

I hoped he didn't remember, but I was glad I did. I remembered _every_ cell of his that had touched me.

I couldn't imagine being as close to him now as I was during his transformation.

There was something about when he couldn't do anything to hurt me that made it so comfortable to be close to him.

Now, there was no telling.

I didn't know much about him.

Would I want to know him? Was he the kind of person that would want to know me?

As Emmett and Edward approached, I noticed they were horsing around and laughing– Emmett's first showcase of real personality and relaxation yet.

I heard Emmett's laugh and my insides melted at the sound.

Emmett's laugh was childlike in how it was unbridled and enthusiastic as he raced Edward closer to the house. Obviously he was winning with his newborn speed, even though Edward was exceptionally fast.

Carlisle trailed behind surveying and observing the situation for protection.

I half-smiled for a fleeting moment at the piano keys as Esme stood from her spot on the sofa, heading to the window to watch them approach.

My fingers danced through Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto Number 3. The one positive thing I'd found from immortality was being able to play the unplayable.

Edward insisted he was a better musician than me.

Obviously he had _sixteen_ more years of this desolate existence to practice. I'd only been sleepless and aimless for two years.

I dedicated myself to piano, the harp, the cello, and the violin to distract myself from the bloodlust which I so intensely despised and the very thought of what Royce King did to me that cursed me to vampirism.

I immediately sensed Emmett's presence right behind me, and I was subsequently intoxicated and distracted by his proximity.

He smelled like tobacco and cedar.

My hands jolted on the keys cacophonously.

I clenched my jaw, frustrated.

"You don't have to stop." Emmett said, his voice sounding shockingly present and controlled.

His voice…

God, it was velvet.

My back stiffened.

"She can't play that section." Edward snickered playfully, trying to get a rise out of me. "Piano is more _my_ forte."

"I prefer the cello anyhow." I said dryly, letting my eyes drop as I slipped on my white gloves.

Emmett's eyes watched my hands with enchantment. It made me want to look up at him.

"It is notably one the most difficult piano concertos in classical repertoire." Esme acknowledged and I shot Edward a look.

He sat down beside me on the piano bench, smug as he reached over my lap to put his hands on the ivories.

I turned and stood up with a sullen sigh, as Edward completed the concerto in arrogant flamboyance.

Esme and Carlisle exchanged a look.

"You still play it much better than I could, Miss Rosalie." Emmett said in a rambling attempt at flattery, catching my eyes and immediately making time stop in its tracks.

The corner of his mouth tugged upward in a childish grin.

I tried not to gawk at him at what I heard.

It sounded so different from the flattery I'd experienced before. I stared at him as I tried to figure out why.

It was…_ innocent_.

Emmett didn't expect anything from me when he told me this.

I allowed him a half smile, but couldn't allow him much because then I'd give him everything.

Something about how honest his eyes were petrified me.

"You should hear her sing. She sings like an angel." Esme sighed happily.

"Well, that seems about right." Emmett smiled a brilliant smile that glistened in his eyes.

Edward snorted, being entirely unbearable as he continued to show off.

"I'd love to hear you sing some time." Emmett blurted without even leaving time to think and I couldn't help but be amused as I looked back at him.

He spoke so freely, like every word tumbled out of his mouth without restraint.

"I don't know…" I exhaled in distanced apprehension, but indulged in his enthrallment with me.

"How are you feeling, Emmett?" Esme asked him compassionately as I no doubt should have, but I wasn't as kind and wonderful as Esme.

I was cold and I played games.

I was filled with self-loathing, but masked it as narcissism.

"Finally like I can almost think…" He said with a full grin this time, dimples on his cheeks that I'd cursed him to this existence after seeing just once. "Thank you."

This was beautifully good news, as I was desperate to know him...

"It was a very good hunting trip." Carlisle reported seeming to comment on Emmett's control, but also beyond that.

I saw that Emmett had begun to fit in with Edward and Carlisle in such a natural way.

Carlisle liked him. He respected him. He cared for him.

The way Emmett looked over at him now made it obvious it was mutual.

I was irrationally jealous.

"That's just lovely to hear." Esme smiled. "But we definitely missed you all around here."

Esme was humiliating as she looked over at me.

"Did you?" Emmett beamed, his eyes heavy on me.

If I could blush, I would have.

God, Esme.

Edward snickered silently.

"I think I'm going to read for a bit." I took an inhale and as I turned on my heel I noticed he started to follow me around the corner toward Carlisle's library.

"Do you mind if I walk with you?" Emmett asked, keeping my pace down the hallway.

I caught Carlisle's glance out of the corner of my eye that was the most fatherly glance I'd ever seen him give.

It was extremely protective, but also a little anticipatory.

It made a sour taste arise in my mouth. After what seemed like a long moment, I responded to Emmett.

"I don't mind." I said softly.

I was supernaturally, extraordinarily aware of his closeness as he walked beside me, not saying anything, just walking next to me.

I felt myself begin to relax slightly, but I remained on guard.

"I never said thank you." He eventually spoke up, his voice weighted in that what he was saying seemed very important to him. "Now that I can almost make sense of the tangle in my head… I…"

"For what?" I asked interrupting him as he rambled because I knew what he was going to say.

"For saving me of course." He laughed, a sweet smile in his crimson eyes as he looked over at me.

I was silent for a long moment, deciding on if I would just respond pleasantly or acknowledge that this was not saving him – this was cursing him.

"I couldn't bear it." I finally said gloomily.

Of course I couldn't bear it to see him dying but that's not all the meaning that my words held. I couldn't bear to go through this existence without something or someone to make it endurable.

"That's funny." He chuckled and I stopped in my tracks, puzzling.

"Bear it. You know… because a bear killed me." He suggested the play on words and I lightened up with a little laugh.

He didn't over-analyze or read into anything.

I felt my insides get bubbly.

He was childish and good-humored, a light in the way he spoke that was entirely unique to him.

I suppressed a humor-filled smile in the corners of my mouth.

I tried to cover my mouth inconspicuously because he was staring at it, and I was feeling self-conscious.

"Too soon?" His rascally smile returned, knowing I caught him staring at my mouth.

My stomach turned nervously.

I turned my head slightly, my smile becoming a growing threat as I turned the door handle.

"Let me." He reached around my shoulder to open the door for me and I held my breath at his closeness, but ultimately kept my cool as we entered Carlisle's study – alone.

We could be heard of course, so I knew the rest of the family was definitely listening.

Emmett left the door open behind us in a way that made it evident he wanted me to notice.

He wanted me to trust him.

I didn't, but I appreciated the gesture all the same.

"Now that's a lot of books." Emmett whistled, noting the floor to ceiling shelves of books.

I clasped my hands behind my back, demure as my eyes scanned the hundreds of titles.

"Most of them are first editions or personally signed for Carlisle." I said with wonder. "Incredible isn't it?"

I furrowed my brow a little. Did I sound too bookish? I didn't want him to think I was boring and scholarly if he didn't like girls that read.

"I'll say." Emmett's red, amber eyes danced over the spines of the books in wonder.

"What do you recommend?" I tested, also trying to make him feel smarter than me because men liked that.

And for my own reasoning, you could tell a lot about a person by what they read.

"I… um…." Emmett's eyes darted over the shelves. "That's not real fair Miss Rosalie, because you're most familiar with what we've got here."

"All right." I offered with a slight smile, climbing the sliding ladder up just a few rungs.

He turned his head to make it obvious that he wasn't staring up my skirt even though I could see he wanted to by the way he fidgeted.

What a gentleman.

I hid my smirk.

I kept my knees glued together and my hand pressing my peplum skirt down regardless.

"Here." I climbed back down and took a light and graceful hop down to the floor, surprising even myself at my gaiety.

I used both hands and my utmost carefulness as I offered him an absolutely unobtainable first edition of William Blake's Songs of Innocence and Experience.

"If we can jump, why do you use a ladder?" Emmett asked, completely ignoring that I'd just placed a priceless artifact of literary history in his hands.

"Habit I suppose." I furrowed my brow, withholding some of the truth.

I liked to pretend I was as human as possible. I longed to be normal even if that meant never using my full strength, full speed, or full capabilities for easiest convenience.

I was also still a lady and I wanted him to see me like one.

I raised an eyebrow and he finally acknowledged the book in his hands.

"Can't wait." The corners of his mouth turned up but his eyes didn't show his smile.

"William Blake personally gave this to Carlisle." I said trying to make him see the marvel in what I saw. "Just look."

I ducked my head forward and over his arm to marvel at the illustration, barely tracing my fingers over the handwritten and engraved artwork.

"Breathtaking," He said, and I noticed his eyes were on me, not the pages.

If my cheeks could flush they would have. In frustration and in flattery.

I cursed myself. He wasn't charmed with me. He didn't like bookish girls and I'd gone and made myself look too intellectual.

But, I was beautiful. If he looked at me long enough, it'd soon be forgotten. He probably wasn't even listening to what I was saying anyhow.

The way he was looking at me…

"We should join the others." I mumbled, my eyes darting down and away from his.

He laughed, a beautiful hearty laugh as he closed the book and tucked it under his arm.

"What is it?" I puzzled, tilting my head to the side and finding his gaze again.

"You've been avoiding me." He said, leaning forward with a devilish and knowing grin.

I leaned away, and he noticed I took a step back.

Through his teasing I caught his seriousness.

"I have not." I denied vehemently, knowing that if I had a heart it would be racing. "You've been gone."

I bit down on my teeth cursing myself for sounding so invested. I couldn't play it cool around him.

"I remember you staying with me through it all." Emmett said, his eyes burning down on me. "The whole hell of becoming this way… like you."

He didn't have to clarify but he did.

"No one should have to be alone for transformation." I justified my presence, still leaning away.

"Still. I remember." He nodded.

I didn't know what to say.

"We should play a game." He said with a rascally smile, sitting down but still bouncing his knees with pent up energy.

He departed from our previous seriousness easily, and he motioned for me to sit next to him, those dimples impossible to resist.

"All right?" I raised an eyebrow, descending to the chair beside him.

I was thankful for the side table between us because there was no hope of accidentally brushing up against him.

"You ask me something and I have to answer and I'll do the same but you have to answer." He proposed, sitting forward so he could be closer to me.

He also didn't seem quite like the type that could sit back and relax either. Even apart from his newborn energy.

"That's not really a game." I bit my bottom lip.

"Okay, I'll start then." He disregarded my statement, and I noticed his eyes lingered on my mouth for the briefest of moments before finding my eyes again.

"What's your favorite song to dance to?" He asked, and I had no idea how to trace the randomness of his thoughts, but they poured out for me all the same.

"I haven't thought of that before." I frowned, still a little taken aback. "And, I haven't danced in quite a while."

"I'm a very good dancer." He told me confidently as if he were trying to impress me.

Of course.

The unshakeable conviction in his eager eyes amused me and I couldn't help but giggle under my breath.

"You don't believe me yet, but you will." Emmett told me with a confidence I'd never known in a man. "You've never danced with a better guy."

It wasn't arrogance. It was just assured.

He intrigued me.

"Is that right?" I flirted a little, unable to believe my own tone and forwardness.

"Yes, and I'm not letting you get away with that terrible answer. What's the first thing that popped into your head?" He pushed in anticipation.

I bit my bottom lip, noticing he genuinely wanted to know what was going on in my head.

This was such a new feeling. I didn't understand. No one had ever… looked at me like this before. I think… he genuinely hung on my words.

"_Let's Fall in Love_." I said, appeasing his request for my first thought because I'd just heard it on the radio.

He grinned, a sparkle in his eyes as his energy built to sky rocket.

"Well now, Miss Rosalie that's awful forward of you." Emmett played my words, knowing he was teasing and getting a rise out of me.

I crumbled under his gaze that seemed to see down to my core.

"It's the name of the song!" I argued, stumbling through the awkwardness he had thrust upon me. "I heard it on the radio, and…"

If I could blush I would have. I had never been this caught off guard in conversation.

His dimples were deep at the edges of his grin, and I got nervous about how attractive he was in this moment. Of course I noticed before that he was… good looking and plenty rugged. I couldn't pretend I didn't.

But, in this moment, I was attracted to him like a magnet.

I squirmed, and he noticed with a smirk. He noticed everything because he was actually looking at me.

_God_.

"Sure." He gave me a wink and I rolled my eyes, no one ever treating me like this in my life. "But, I think if you gave me a chance…"

"Are we playing a game or not?" I huffed in false impatience at his childish playfulness.

I couldn't begin to brave the conversation he so boldly was entering into.

"I was serious about that chance, Miss Rosalie. I swear in front of God." Emmett held up his right hand, a flirtatious smile in his eyes as he still expanded on his word play.

"I think it's my turn." I rolled my eyes, but I couldn't think of a question.

I had so many.

"Tell me about your life… before." I requested softly, my eyes deeply captive in his.

"Surely you see that's not a question, doll face." Emmett raised an eyebrow in good humor.

I wrinkled my nose at the nickname, not super keen on that. Of course, he noticed.

"Oh, all right. What's something you'll miss about being human?" I wondered immediately

"Smokes and booze." Emmett answered quickly and thoughtlessly, nodding his head to signal he was satisfied with his answer.

It was instinctual.

I didn't even have time to process his crudity before me moved on with the game.

"My turn. Why'd you save me when you could'a just left me cold?"

He went straight to my gut, and it hit a nerve. I paused, struggling with constructing my words for a second.

"Really, what made me worth all this?" Now, he looked right into my eyes, tucking a stray curl behind my ear.

His touch was tender, and alive and he lowered his raspy but velvet voice as he did it. It sent jolts of electricity through my icy veins.

I couldn't relax. I was on fire and my thoughts were a tangled mess so I leaned away from his uninvited touch.

It was the first time he'd asked, but I knew it was coming.

"I just couldn't bear it." I repeated my earlier sentiment, getting nervous as he fought for my eyes, not letting me look away from him.

"I know. You told me that already." Emmett wasn't letting me get away with that one either and he leaned forward seeming to challenge my answer.

I took a deep breath, the smell of cedar filling my senses and making my resolve weaken.

"You just reminded me of someone." I settled on this, my legs feeling weak and my head feeling faint at my unbridled honesty around him.

"Not an old boyfriend I hope." Emmett snickered, a flirtatious teasing to his tone.

"Not in the slightest." I spoke as evenly as I could, but I analyzed my voice enough to know it had shaken slightly.

This exchange pleased him. The subsequent smile on his face and those dimples I'd saved him for after seeing just once made me glad I'd said it. He seemed satisfied with this answer for now.

"Maybe a new one, then." He suggested in a voice that I hadn't heard him use before.

It was low in his gut, almost _soft_.

I could've exploded into a million pieces then at his forwardness, but instead I just giggled.

Me.

I_ laughed_.

It bubbled up like soda fizz from my core and seemed to radiate out of the ends of my fingers and toes and the ends of my hair.

He grinned now, responding to my laughter with a beaming, beautiful smile of his own.

I was drawn to him.

Emmett didn't push me. He let me laugh, even though it probably seemed I was laughing at him and his fresh request.

I kind of _was_ laughing at him.

"I may be a simple man, Miss Rosalie, but I do know how to treat a lady." His voice was velvety as he addressed what he believed to be my deepest concern about him.

He wanted me to trust him. It wasn't just a put-on. I saw it in his eyes, and as I was hypnotized by his irises, he reached out for my hand.

In my hypnosis I let his fingers wrap around mine, but only for the swiftest of moments did I allow him to touch me.

I wore day gloves, but through the fabric, his skin scalded mine.

"If you'll allow it." He expanded, his eyes darting down to where he had my hand in his.

It wasn't as my hand had been held before. My fingers weren't to the ground and my knuckles to the sky so a man could show his affection and adoration by kissing my knuckles. He was not holding my hand like a suitor.

My hand was in Emmett's like a man shakes another man's hand - like _equals_ \- and I couldn't help but think our hands were clasped like partners agreeing on something.

We were making a contract for the mystery of the future between us.

Could I do it?

My skin was on fire. My stomach was in knots.

"I'm sure your Tennessee girls found you _quite_ charming." I retracted my hand, coy as I stood up and away from her.

I played games like I would have before.

He didn't try again to take my hand, but his confidence was unshaken and I grabbed a collection of Lyrical Poetry by Wordsworth and Coleridge to hold to my chest.

He crossed his huge arms over his broad chest, tilting his head to the side as he stood after me.

"Oh, they did, the whole lot of them. But, none of those gals could keep my attention long." He smiled, amused.

"How unfortunate." I remained removed, but my throat was starting to get tight as I fought the tiniest of smiles.

I don't know why I still expected him not to be so… honest and upfront with me.

But then my stomach dropped as I even imagined him with someone else. I couldn't bear it.

I wondered if I could keep his attention. I mean, I was beautiful, impossibly beautiful, but… was it enough?

"I was quite bored, really." He shrugged.

I decided against responding and turned my shoulder, feeling demure.

This time, he stood in front of me, using inhuman speed to block my exit. His hand on my upper arm burned my skin, but as I looked up into his brilliant eyes, I noticed I didn't mind it so much.

"I think I was always s'posed to know you, Miss Rosalie." He looked down on me, telling me this like he was telling war secrets and the information I was receiving was of utmost importance.

I swallowed, his presence overwhelming my senses, especially with his hand still wrapped around my arm. I felt meek and small and so I looked away.

"You were s'posed to know me, too." He insisted. "I think you'd very much like to know me."

I couldn't help but smile now, a tiny giggle escaping my lips.

It was a nervous giggle, and I hated myself for it, but mostly - I was amused with him.

"I would?" I teased him, but he was serious.

"You would." He grinned. "And, I believe I'd like to know you too."

I suddenly realized that I thought this was the most romantic thing anyone had ever said to me.

"Then, I shall let you know me." I told him.

And, I think I meant it.

"Really?" He beamed like a child on Christmas morning.

I smiled, really smiled, and not a smile I had once used in my games for men's attention.

"You won't regret that one bit, Miss Rosalie." He stepped aside letting me pass him at the threshold now.

"Just Rosalie." I turned back to him, coy as I thought about allowing him to address me informally

"Just Rosalie," He smiled, those dimples making me weak at the knees as he followed me back down the hallway toward the others.

I couldn't pretend I didn't catch that his eyes danced over my back before he caught up with me to walk by my side with a goofily innocent grin.

"That's a beautiful dress, _Rosalie_." He said, trying out my name on his lips, and also openly commenting that he'd checked the dress out from multiple angles.

I knew it hugged my figure marvelously, and the navy color blue looked magnificent against my ivory skin and golden hair. I knew it was beautiful, and I knew he would like it, but it did feel nice to hear him say he liked it.

I noticed Edward's hands fell cacophonously on the ivories causing a discordant arrangement of sounds that I hated to admit was entirely uncharacteristic for him.

He'd heard something in Emmett's thoughts that was unavoidably bold.

"Thank you. It was a gift." I clutched the book to my chest.

Maybe he'd interpret that gift to mean I had another man's attention. A girl was only as good as the men who wanted her in this modern dating society.

I was used to being wanted – for as long as I remember, but I was… nervous.

I'd been down this path before.

"Wait." He reached out and grabbed my arm so fast and so hard that it startled me.

I jerked my arm away, my eyes wide, as I inelegantly stumbled away from him, looking up at him in horror.

In a silly and irrational reaction, I held onto the part of my arm he'd grabbed with my other hand tenderly like he'd burned my skin.

I retreated, taking a step back as I picked up my dropped book, wrapping my arms around myself and holding the book in front of me in a shield. Shame filled my every thought as I realized just how much his advance had frightened me to my core. Old sights, smells, and sounds flooded my present senses as old wounds were ripped anew, and I was reminded the risk of him.

I was reminded how unsafe I felt.

I was lost again inside myself, and I knew with certainty no one could possibly understand.

"What is it?" Carlisle appeared panicked in front of us immediately at the concern in Emmett's voice and the sight of me.

We both followed Emmett's eyes though as they focused up toward the hundreds of years old cross of Carlisle's hanging on the wall.

I sighed.

"I just…" Emmett was still staring upward.

"Oh." Carlisle half-chuckled, acknowledging the irony. "Family heirloom. My father was a part of an Anglican clergy in England."

"But don't we?..." Emmett started, pointing up. "I mean… everybody tells stories."

"We are unaffected by the crucifix, Emmett." Carlisle explained with slight amusement.

Emmett was trying to protect me earlier…

I darted my eyes down.

"Oh." He registered. "I mean… that makes sense. Why in God's name would it be in your house?"

"Forgive your impulsiveness these first few months; your instincts are entirely new to you and at times intensely difficult to respond to rationally." Carlisle explained not only for Emmett's benefit, but rather for mine.

He was telling me not to cruelly punish him for not rising to my impossibly high standards during his newborn discomfiture.

Carlisle didn't understand. I couldn't ever make him understand.

I had no control…

No control…

I was powerless and Emmett was out of control too.

"Still, I'm so… sorry I…." Emmett looked at me with sincerity and real remorse.

I exhaled trying to have him read forgiveness in my eyes that I had to muster from deep down.

"Honest mistake." Carlisle acknowledged lightly.

"I can't believe…" He laughed a full-bodied laugh. "You must think I'm batty."

His laughter filled my lungs as we entered the living room with everyone else.

"Get it?" He smiled at me and I just nodded, amused but unable to return his smile.

"Because vampires turn into bats…" Edward groaned but was well-meaning. "Good God, Emmett, you make the worst jokes. Rosalie, I blame you for an eternity of this."

Emmett grinned at me and I knew what he was thinking without having Edward's abilities.

An eternity of this.

"At least someone's making some jokes around here." Esme said with a sweet smile. "We all enjoy your… liveliness, dear."

She chose the word wisely and it was incredibly accurate. Liveliness was something this house had been missing. It was something I'd been missing not only these past two years, but also all of my life.

"Well, thank you ma'am." Emmett ducked his head in a polite bow of sorts. "I do believe that's the most polite way I've ever been described."

"People usually use other words for it." He raised an eyebrow and Edward joined him in laughter, Carlisle and Esme harmonizing.

I couldn't imagine how out of control he was. I'd grown to accept men were different in that way. They couldn't control themselves, and that scared me… But especially Emmett.

Emmett was wild.

I sat on the sofa next to the arm closest to the fireplace, the book in my lap as I smoothed my dress over my knees.

Emmett took the seat next to me confidently and without hesitation. He didn't just sit next to me. He sat close beside me when there was plenty of room.

I frowned, noticing I couldn't be any closer to the arm of the couch and his knee was mere centimeters from mine.

I could almost feel his close energy like heat on my skin. It was stifling, but if I left the room I'd never hear the end of it from Carlisle, Esme, and Edward.

Emmett wasn't ready to process Carlisle's entire story of centuries of information so he just got the basic facts of a story that I'd already heard about his initial transformation into a vampire in the sewers of London and how we all came to be "vegetarians."

I turned my knees away from Emmett slowly – otherworldly slowly – so he wouldn't notice, but my muscles were tensed to stone.

He was so relaxed, feeling at home here even more than I did.

He was comfortable next to me in a way I couldn't imagine being with him.

"I still don't believe you're a vampire." Emmett acknowledged me. "I just can't begin to picture it."

"Well…" I swallowed, a flash of my brutality when killing Royce and his friends coming to mind. "Sometimes I don't believe it either."

He didn't know the half of how ruthless I could be now.

I wished he'd never have this bubble of naivety burst.

Edward shot me a glance and gave an inconspicuous little shrug.

"We are quite different from traditional folklore, and even others of our kind." Esme offered kindly.

"So I'll never get old and live in a castle?" Emmett pursed his lips in pseudo frustration, full of childish humor.

"No, we are frozen in this state for eternity." Carlisle explained. "You will no longer grow, change, or age from this moment."

"Well, hot dog!" Emmett had a grin in his voice. "So I can't die again?"

"The only way a vampire can die is being torn apart and burning the pieces." Carlisle revealed clinically.

"Looks like I'll be avoiding bonfires." He said, full of lightheartedness. "What about garlic?"

He was taking this so well.

"Barely an inconvenience." Edward responded this time.

Edward was almost smiling. Something about Emmett entertained, amused, and even lightened him.

"And obviously the sunlight thing's a lie."

I learned he'd found out on this last hunting trip.

I looked away, unable to imagine him like that. It was too… much. There was something intimate and exposing about the way our skin reacted to the sunlight. It seemed intensely _vulnerable_, and I couldn't imagine vulnerability.

Not now. Not ever.

"So tell us a little about yourself." Esme prompted.

"Your name… It's Scotch-Irish?" Carlisle asked to provide detail as a streamline for Esme's start.

He was always interested in stories of families and history of coming to America. I'd imagine Carlisle felt connected to these stories seeing as he lived one.

Emmett today looked more human and ready to talk than he had ever before, and I had to admit now that he was ready to talk, I was interested as well.

There was something in his smile and the faith in his eyes that made me rashly and stupidly decide to damn him to an eternal hell. I might as well hear what kind of life I robbed him of.

The space where my silent heart sat seemed hollow.

Emmett grinned a rascally grin, dimples on his cheeks and fire in his eyes.

"The Good Lord knows I'm never allowed to forget that" He responded. "You know how proud those Irish are."

"Oh, I do." Carlisle smiled, and I knew from stories that he spent some brief time in Ireland in one of his many lifetimes.

"My father's parents and grandparents came over by way of Ellis Island a while back." Emmett explained.

"How was the city for them?" Carlisle raised an eyebrow. "I was there for a time where things… weren't friendly for Irish Catholics."

Emmett shrugged, but seemed interested in Carlisle's experience.

"Oh, my grandparents used to tell the story of how 'the natives' as they called 'em were yelling and screaming and throwin' things at their families as they walked down the docks those very first steps in America. They were only kids when their whole town packed up and moved together." Emmett recalled and I pictured him young… as a wide-eyed child with a big family that talked too much.

I knew it was impolite to converse so freely, but somehow his candid honesty seemed refreshing and even a little charming.

"And so they chose to move to Tennessee?" Carlisle went on.

"Well, they eventually both came to the South 'cause both their fathers were hired to take somebody's place on the draft and fight for the Union there. They ended up dyin' for a country they'd only been in for six months. A country that hated 'em to begin with." Emmett said humorlessly but ironically.

"Were you around for the Civil War?" Emmett asked, interested as any man would be.

Men and war and guns and money and things I'd never been permitted to hear about or have any sort of interest or investment in.

Carlisle nodded, his expression grave.

"It was absolutely unimaginable." Carlisle said finally.

Edward shuddered, turning his head like he didn't like what he was hearing in Carlisle's thoughts.

Esme put her hand in Carlisle's, lacing their fingers together in support of one another.

I took a quick glance at Emmett's hand as it rested on his nervously bouncing knee but pulled my glance back to Carlisle's face.

I knew Carlisle hated to see the darkness of the humanity he fought so endlessly to protect.

Carlisle had mentioned that as a doctor on the battlefield, the atrocities he saw during the Civil War were significant factors in prompting him to so desperately need a companion through his existence.

Then, half a century later, after helping in France during the World War, he returned to Chicago for the Spanish Influenza epidemic and two weeks later the transformation of Edward Masen.

"My father was in the Great War. He enlisted when I was a baby so I don't remember any of it." Emmett answered simply.

"I was a doctor in France for Ardennes and Verdun then traded war for epidemics and came back to Chicago… Where was your father?"

Edward snorted at the mention of his epidemic.

"He never talked about it." Emmett shrugged. "But Ma always complained when he wasn't around that he was still lost in the Argonne Forest."

Carlisle grimaced and I swear his face got paler in knowing what that riddle meant.

Obviously, I didn't pay enough attention to the plights of others to truly understand what happened, but I knew my own father had lost many friends in the war.

"War changes a man." Carlisle said, trying to make amends for whatever caused the darkness in Emmett's eyes.

I couldn't empathize as Carlisle could, but I still ached at the thought of any hardship in Emmett's life.

"Which is why I'd still prefer getting eaten alive by a bear and joining the undead." Emmett grinned, leaving the previous subject smoothly.

He spoke of his deepest fears and vulnerabilities with absolute candor. He hid nothing. His mind was as open to the room as it was to Edward.

I noticed I was staring; my eyes were wide and I was slightly open-mouthed, gaping at him as he spoke. I'd never heard someone speak so liberally. His words were unreserved and bold.

I couldn't help but wonder if this was what it was like when the men would gather for after dinner drinks and cigarettes as they played cards.

I'd never been spoken to like this or heard someone speak like this in my life. As a woman, and especially as a young attractive woman of social standard, no one ever talked with me.

I guess they thought I was just supposed to sit still and look pretty – that I didn't have a single thought floating around in my head.

Emmett's eyes caught mine and he laughed freely, obviously seeing my astonishment.

"I'm sorry." He chuckled casually. "I don't want y'all to think I don't got any manners since I've been talkin' about… improper subjects… in front of mixed company." Emmett made a face toward Esme, but his eyes lingered on me.

When he was worked up, his accent made him so difficult to understand, but it was so charming I couldn't help but bite my lip from a smile.

God, he melted me and I hated him for it. I reconstructed my icy exterior.

"Oh it's quite alright." Esme chuckled lightly shooting her eyes my way as if I should've said something.

I bit down on my teeth, refusing.

"We could listen to you talk all day, dear." Esme responded kindly and with a grand smile. "We all are just eager to know you."

"Well thank you kindly, but I'm just as eager to know y'all." Emmett's eyes were on me, but then scanned over the rest of the room quickly.

His accent…

"Tell us more about your family." Esme began. "Did you have any siblings?"

"Six little sisters, so I was the oldest of seven." Emmett recalled.

I felt my eyes widen. Six. Sisters.

God.

I was an only child so I couldn't begin to imagine.

"Your mother must've been a very patient woman." Esme giggled kindly.

Emmett made a face, amused at this.

"She had her hands full with me that's for sure." Emmett snorted, full of good humor. "I reckon you understand why already."

Esme giggled happily.

He paused and I watched darkness enter his eyes.

"I don't get to see 'em again do I?" Emmett asked with a heavy tone.

Carlisle and Esme exchanged a glance before Carlisle spoke.

"No. You don't." Carlisle sighed with sadness. "We have to make sure everyone believes you're dead, and it wouldn't be safe to see them."

Emmett paused for a little while and I wondered what he was thinking. Edward seemed to be following without change in his expression.

"I understand." Emmett finally responded, a darkness in his eyes I wanted to know about.

"So, what about you, Rosalie?" He asked me to change the subject, returning to our game.

"I was an only child." I responded shortly but was still nervous about talking to him.

"Where'd you grow up?" He looked upon me with interested eyes. "Wait, let me guess."

"Okay." I appeased him with a nod.

"You were a princess in some fancy place…" He trailed off.

"Rochester, New York." I interrupted his thought, not wanting to get too deep in memories and questions.

"The princess of Rochester, New York then." He accepted he was right with a smile.

"Something like that." I snorted.

He wasn't _that_ far off. But, if I'd gotten married, I would have been a Queen...

Edward looked down and away at the thoughts in my head.

"Did it snow in New York?" Emmett asked, sparkling curiosity in his gaze.

"All the time." I appeased him with a little smile.

"I've never seen snow." Emmett told me, interest and wonder in his tone. "When did you grow up in Rochester?"

He questioned, knowing now that he was a vampire this was also an interesting plot point.

He'd heard Carlisle and Esme's stories and listened with glimmering interest, fascinated by their fairytales.

"I was born in 1915." I answered, slightly amused that he'd not known better than to ask a woman's age.

He was over the moon excited by this fact.

"Me too!" He grinned widely, enjoying this common ground regardless how small. "Some time in spring. What about you?"

"I was born in January. The 13th." I remembered, not having celebrated in quite a while.

"You're still pretty new to this vampire thing too, then?" Emmett brought up a sore subject and my smile disappeared.

"Relatively." I answered in a heavy breath cursing him for shattering my walls again and again and bringing forward new vulnerability.

"So with all this free time now, what do you like to do for fun, Miss Rosalie?" He went another direction with the conversation than I'd anticipated.

I watched the corner of Edward's mouth turn up as he prepared for a snarky remark.

"Fun? Rosalie?" Edward chuckled. "She doesn't know what fun is."

"Edward…" Esme scolded.

"Well, that's sure gotta change!" Emmett grinned.

"Under the appropriate circumstances, I've had fun before." I said under my breath but was careful not to mumble impolitely.

"Well, what do you consider 'appropriate circumstances?'" Emmett quoted my own words seeming to teasingly press me.

"I… Well…" I felt flustered.

"I see Rosalie recommended Blake." Carlisle saved me, eyeing Edward disapprovingly.

"She does have quite good taste in literature." Edward added trying to make amends.

I lifted my chin, proud and confident but was also still afraid of looking bookish.

Emmett made a face and Edward's brow furrowed, his smug smile disappearing.

"She… _Rosalie_ said it was a gift to you." Emmett rearranged, seeming to want to say my name.

"Oh, it was and one of my most prized." Carlisle beamed and I smiled at myself, pleased.

"Have you read any Blake?" Carlisle asked with an easy-going smile.

"I always said I'd get around to it." Emmett smiled tightly, joy missing from his eyes.

"Now, you can read it as it was meant to be experienced." I offered lightly with a soft smile.

He quickly stood to his feet, his eyes darting toward the window.

"I'm sorry. I just…" He put his hands at his throat in what was obviously a pantomime and not a reaction; his eyes were a brilliant color.

He just got back.

Edward stood with him almost simultaneously.

What is he thinking? I thought at Edward purposefully.

He turned his head to the left, then slowly to the right refusing me.

"I'll go with him." Edward offered swiftly, and Carlisle and Esme both exchanged a look.

I opened my mouth to say something, but before I could he and Edward had flown out the door, racing toward the horizon.

Emmett's voice still rang in my ears, and when I touched my cheek I imagined it was sore from smiling more than I ever had in my life.

With him gone, I could spend some time reconstructing my fortress. I was left too vulnerable.


	5. Delilah

Here's a new extended chapter! Thank you so much for your kind words and reviews! I LOVE hearing your thoughts and appreciate your time sharing them with me.

This chapter is in Edward's POV.

Thank you so much for reading! Enjoy!

* * *

_**Delilah**_

_It's a different kind of danger  
And the bells are ringing out  
And I'm calling for my mother  
As I pull the pillars down  
It's a different kind of danger  
And my feet are spinning around  
Never knew I was a dancer  
'Till Delilah showed me how_

* * *

**Edward** \- A _Thirst for Learning_

"Edward… I have a problem." Emmett paced outside once we'd gotten far enough away from the house.

His feet burned a hole in the grass as he paced back and forth at a meta-human speed.

I knew before he even said it aloud, but nonetheless I waited.

"Now, you can't go squawking this to the first person you see but… I never really learned how to read." Emmett admitted with the most devastating shame in his eyes. "There was never a reason I shoulda learnt how so… I didn't."

"I'll teach you." I offered immediately. "It'll be easy to learn now with your vampiric retention, and I'm a pretty good teacher I'll say."

Emmett chuckled at this, laughing just a little. There was relief in his thoughts, but not much.

"But more than all that, Rosalie's real fancy and I just… Obviously I'm not. I'm not even in the league." Emmett sighed.

"Don't say that." I encouraged.

"I mean, I'm still gonna make her my girl. I'm just very aware I'd be over reaching." Emmett snickered.

Of course.

I couldn't help but laugh at his confidence.

"I'm serious." Emmett nodded, and he was. "She's already caught on to how plain I am. I mean, I don't even know how to talk to her! I was a babbling idiot because I don't know anything about things she likes."

"She just makes you nervous, and you're still trying to get the hang of this vampire thing." I said.

"I'll say." He snorted a laugh.

"You make her nervous too." I said matter-of-factly, rounding the arc.

He looked back up, optimism in his eyes.

"How do you know?" He asked quickly.

I shrugged knowing that I'd said too much and used some suggestive words.

"Did she say anything about me?"

No… I read her thoughts just like I was reading his right now.

"I'm sworn to secrecy." I said knowing that my secrecy was only going to suggest more.

But, he needed a little confidence and a little push to pursue her – also selfishly because I couldn't endure decades of them trying to get together but neither one of them making a substantial move.

He grinned victoriously.

"Lord, I'm just dizzy with that Rosalie Hale," Emmett broke out to a glee-filled run beside me, taking a fast spin around himself and jumping over the stream.

He was just that…

And his thoughts were making _me_ dizzy. His thoughts were fragmented flashes of vivid images of her, but not the way anyone had seen her before.

I was absolutely fascinated with the way he saw Rosalie and the tiny things he noticed about her.

I had been living with her for almost two years now and I could hear her thoughts but, I'd never picked up that she absently braided and unbraided the same inch wide strand of hair over her left shoulder while she read with a book in her lap.

He'd lived in our house for a month and was plagued with the distraction of being a newborn but still he saw it. He noticed it, and was enchanted by such a small gesture.

His thoughts then flashed to a fuzzy human memory, something I hadn't seen before: she was standing over him, sunlight behind her.

_'I'm not leaving you,'_ she said, her voice sounding much different in his ears.

It was angelic and song-like instead of how I heard it…

I found Rosalie's voice incredibly maddening. I hated that she over-enunciated her words, dropping her 'r' sounds and rounding out her vowels to sound swankier like a Hollywood actress.

He adored it.

In my perception of the memory, I saw the thirst in her eyes and knew she was convincing herself not to kill him out of bloodlust. That explained the determination in her voice, but he still didn't pick up on that connection.

He thought she could do anything, that she was limitless.

I had heard millions of thoughts about her from years past and all of them were pretty much the same, but _his_ perception of her was so pure and sanguine that it intrigued me.

I didn't even mind that I was intruding on his thoughts without the disclosure of my 'gift.'

He sighed, slowing down for a moment, still just love-struck as he swung from a tree branch to come back to where I stood.

He turned to ask me something I didn't expect.

It came out of nowhere in his thought process. But it was like a shooting star, immediately as it tore across his mind, it resonated enough that he had to speak it aloud.

"How did she die, Edward?" Emmett asked plainly. "Carlisle said he'd never change people that had another choice. And, I know everyone's story but hers."

"Um…" I stalled to collect my thoughts. "That's something she'll have to tell you."

This satisfied him, and he nodded.

"So, it was bad?" He asked.

"All death is bad, Emmett." I said with a shrug, not sure if I believed that.

He was again mollified with this answer though.

"Mine wasn't. I'm so glad I died." Emmett said contentedly.

I sighed.

"Rosalie's different than the rest of us in that way… She's… _not_ glad." I stumbled over my words trying to explain it to him.

I knew Rosalie would kill me brutally if I had revealed any more than that.

"Does she miss her human life?" Emmett pressed, wanting to know every bit that he could.

He was testing my boundaries as well. I saw this in his thoughts.

I recognized I'd already said too much then, but I had to respond. His eyes were heavy on me.

"Parts of it." I tried to let him know this was all I could really say with a glance of finality.

He stopped in his tracks, seeing some wild roses, avoiding their thorns out of habit as he picked a few.

I rolled my eyes, of course knowing what he was thinking.

"You know her. You have to tell me what she's like." He prodded.

_Incredibly difficult, vain, impossible to stand. _

"She doesn't like flowers." I played it safe, remembering hearing her distaste for roses and violets after… everything she'd been through.

"You're not… She's not _spoken for_, right?" Emmett's eyes were wide as he dropped the flowers.

His thoughts sunk deep as he thought irrationally that Rosalie and I were together.

"Oh no. No way." I shook my head.

"Good. I was thinking, I sure don't wanna have to fight you, Edward." Emmett began. "Cause I'd win and humiliate you in front of your girl."

I knew what he was thinking and it was exactly what he was saying. Everything he thought, he said or did.

It was refreshing.

I laughed, actually laughed.

"I might surprise you." I shrugged, still not knowing how to tell him about my gift.

Rosalie was incredibly upset by it, even _repulsed_, and wanted to keep as far away from me as possible. She felt that the compromised privacy was too much for her to bear.

She'd learned French just so she could think in a language I didn't understand.

He thought briefly about the possibility, but ultimately decided he knew he would win with ultimate confidence.

"I don't get surprised." Emmett said confidently.

Oh, he had no idea.

But, I did see a human memory in his mind that did surprise _me_.

He was in a dark room and a cloud of cigarette smoke. He spit out blood onto the dirt floor, wiping his mouth with his black and blue knuckles, as he looked down on a man twice his size with a smug smile. People cheered.

As someone grabbed his wrist and thrust his hand into the sky, I noticed his hands were small, his arms were skinny, and his height also suggested he was much younger. No more than a starving twelve-year-old boy.

His hubris delighted me in a playfully competitive way, and the threat of a contest was the only thing that seemed to distract his mind from the dizzying tangle of Rosalie Hale.

"Well you haven't met me." I narrowed my eyes.

"That sounds like a challenge Edward." Emmett grinned an anticipatory grin, thinking about lunging at me playfully.

I anticipated his move, darting to the side so he tumbled forward in the grass, causing a deep cavern of displaced soil as he skidded across the earth.

"Okay… Okay…." He held up his hands in surrender with a laugh as he climbed out of the hole he'd dug himself into. "I underestimated how fast you are."

I winked as he brushed the dirt off his arms.

"I forgot to mention I read thoughts." I said casually knowing now was as good a time as ever.

"You're lying." He laughed heartily and with incredulity.

"Sometimes, vampires develop certain special abilities after transformation." I explained.

He thought I was joking.

"You don't believe me." I said.

"It doesn't take a mind-reader to know that." He responded, raising an eyebrow.

"The memory you visited. You were young, and you won a fighting match of some kind." I didn't know if this was a touchy subject so I treaded lightly.

He thought a curse word I wasn't going to repeat aloud just to prove my point.

"Well, I guess that settles it." Emmett nodded. "You read minds."

He wasn't alarmed or taken aback or disgusted by the lack of privacy. In fact, he was startlingly indifferent and unimpressed.

"So, what is it like? Do you see pictures or is it words too?" Emmett asked casually, as no one had asked before.

"Um…" I was taken aback by his honesty, even as someone that is so rarely surprised. "Well, it's usually just a hum until I focus on something specific or know someone's… well, _inner_ voice so well that it's distinguishable. But, I guess it's kind of a combination of words and pictures. It's hard to describe."

"So… what am I saying?" He tested like a child playing a game and I shook my head in a fit of real laughter.

"You just told me you wish you had a million dollars." I laughed, though that thought was hardly original enough to stump me.

"Hot dog. Well, I guess I do believe you." Emmett shrugged.

"So, I suppose the match is uneven." I sighed confidently.

"Never stopped me before." Emmett prepped, curling his shoulders like he was ready to pounce again. "I'll fight if you will."

I nodded, admitting to myself I was enjoying this.

I saw in his thoughts the memory again. This time he acknowledged I saw it.

"I was twelve and I won ten whole dollars for that one." He grinned proudly, his thoughts in perfect harmony with his words.

We circled one another calculating our moves, the entire woods becoming our ring. It had been so long since I'd just done something for the sheer fun of it.

"It was the first win I ever had and after that I _never_ lost. Before, I just got a couple cents to get the crap beaten out of me every weekend." Emmett shrugged, still full of humor.

He held nothing back and it was refreshing.

I saw blood and bruises and lots of it in his thoughts - sometimes his own, but mostly others'.

His thoughts betrayed that he was distracting me and going to lunge at me from the right, so I readjusted on the defensive before he could even move.

He chuckled at this, returning to the circle we danced around one another.

"So your town had a fight club?" I asked, remembering waiting outside plenty of those for my human kills of shady men during my time away from Carlisle and Esme.

Emmett's thoughts flashed back to that dark room and a cloud of cigarette smoke.

I shifted my weight forward as if I was going to dart at him, and he reacted swiftly and inelegantly. I smirked.

"_Has_ a fight club. It's amazing what some rich people will pay to watch a hungry kid fight for a meal." Emmett said, but his tone made it sound less like a sob story and more of a common, amusing observation.

"So you had to?" I asked without a complete question.

He had to fight to support his family.

He looked like a predator stalking his prey, but his prey just happened to be another predator with a distinct advantage on him.

"Well, sure, yeah I guess I had to, but as I got older and better, I _wanted_ to." He smiled excitedly.

I anticipated the lunge that would send him tumbling to the ground again, hitting a tree with a smack that sounded like a gunshot.

The tree uprooted on the side he'd hit and he looked at me with a goofy smile.

"Whoops." He chuckled then returned to the conversation.

"Once I started getting _really_ good - so good they'd fight me outnumbered and with _advantages_, more money came _and_ it got more fun. Obviously, I'd get more money the more uneven the match was and the whole time my mama just thought I was just really good at managing our land." Emmett spoke fondly of what seemed to me like a perfect atrocity.

The advantages he spoke of were weapons - chains and baseball bats and blunt objects from darkest creativity. The dim light, the dirt clouds, and the crowd roaring seemed hellish to me, but to him – he looked on it all with nostalgia and attachment.

He took advantage of my distraction, tackling me to the ground with enough brute force that the indention of our bodies would potentially dig a hole to China.

"How'd you keep it from your family?" I wondered as we struggled against one another.

He was ungodly strong, even for a newborn vampire.

I theorized for a moment that strength was his defining gift in vampirism because of his display of it in his human life.

I knew Carlisle would find this interesting.

"I don't know." He said as his back crashed into a boulder from where I'd pushed him, the rock beginning to crumble.

For the first time, his thoughts were inharmonious with his words.

I saw in Emmett's thoughts a flash of him in his youth ripping a man out of a screaming and shoving match with a woman that I recognized he regarded as his father and mother. The man whirled around, rearing back and letting his fist fly as Emmett unsuccessfully ducked behind his arms and ended up with a black eye.

His father…

It's easy to hide bruises from a fight club when you collect them at home too.

I don't think it registered to Emmett that I'd heard these thoughts so clearly and I couldn't bear the thought of taking advantage of his distraction by such a thing, so as he whirled around, pinning my own back to the boulder, I surrendered.

"You win." I choked out as my back crunched against the boulder., almost feeling the wind knocked out of me if it were possible for a vampire.

His grin was intensely satisfied in such a childlike way.

"Two out of three?" He raised an eyebrow.

"No. We need to get some work done." I tried to get serious. "Let's get started."

"Fine." Emmett's jovial nature disappeared as he sunk to sit on the ground like a sullen child.

He looked up at me, ready to be taught how to read, but not really enjoying himself. The self sacrifice in his eyes was so real, and I got a glimmer of something in his thoughts that made it obvious he was capable of falling in _love_ with Rosalie.

He was doing this for her, no matter how much he despised it.

I cleared my throat, taking a stick and drawing some letters in the dirt.

Emmett was willing to learn, and the new abilities of his vampire brain to multitask and compartmentalize and retain made it so much easier for him. He made immense progress in just a couple hours, and as the sun began to sink beneath the horizon, we barely seemed to notice.

He'd gotten the hang of phonetics with ease, and he avoided my eyes always - hating to imagine himself less a man than me.

Emmett was extremely forthcoming and open with his thoughts, but another thing about his thoughts that was refreshing was that he was honest with himself. He didn't like to imagine anyone being better than him, but he never viewed himself as any better than anyone else either.

He was self-aware in a way most people I'd read hadn't been.

It was honestly pretty rejuvenating to my faith….

"Alright. You've done well. Now, you need to go try and win Rosalie's frozen heart." I distracted him again. "Race you back to the house?"

He agreed with a goofily optimistic smile, and I of course anticipated that he was going to cheat with a head start as he jumped from the ground and leapt into a sprint.

It all happened quickly then.

The wind changed and so did he.

He immediately transformed into the monster of nightmares at the scent of a small group of people coming from about 5 miles north.

"Emmett! No!" I bellowed desperately, following at his heels just far enough away from him to not be able to reach out and grab him.

I pushed myself beyond limits, reaching out and almost grabbing the fabric of his shirt.

I was just too far away.

His thoughts were wild and incoherent, but laser focused on one subject - blood.

My throat burned and I fought intensely against the temptation myself.

I was close enough to see the look in the little girl's big blue eyes as Emmett killed her entire family in front of her and then lunged straight for her last, just before she could even muster up a scream.

Emmett held the little girl like he was coming to spin her round in his outstretched arms while she giggled and smiled carelessly in idyllic childhood bliss. It looked like he was whispering something in her ear, but I knew better; her big blue eyes seemed to stare right into mine as the life got sucked right out of her.

Her cupid's bow lips lost all of their color and her mouth was in a little 'o' like she was just getting ready to scream.

Emmett hissed at me over his shoulder as he let her body fall lifeless to the ground right next to the rest of her family's.

I looked upon the little girl, no more than five or six, but she was exceptionally small and starving. She looked like a little porcelain doll, her skin so white and bloodless.

"Oh God…" I could barely function.

_A little girl_…

Emmett wasn't registering yet what had happened as he defensively turned on me with a snarl.

I still stepped forward, closing her eyes out of respect, my stomach feeling tight and guilty.

Carlisle would be so disappointed in me.

I'd let this happen. I was drowning in shame.

"Emmett, no." I tiredly scolded him, not wanting to fight.

"What have you done?…" I asked rhetorically in a breath, hating to see an entire family slaughtered out of his lust.

His growl turned to something more of a struggling groan.

That's when I followed his wild eyes and noticed something impossibly even more tragic.

The mother had a hunting knife in her cold grip, and one of her children already had a stab wound in its tiny heart.

It was a boy, barely a year old. He'd been asleep when his own mother gutted him.

He was dead before we even got here.

The rest of the family had the intent to die as well.

It was a family suicide…

The spilt blood of the baby is what caught Emmett's attention to begin with. There was no hope against spilled blood.

Emmett was breathing heavily, growling like some sort of wild animal as he dropped to his hands and knees.

He was trying to gain control.

In primal pain, he dropped his forehead to the grass, knotting his fingers over his head as he groaned.

He was realizing what he'd done…

He was letting his humanity back in and it was retaking him in a pained lurch.

"Emmett." I reminded him his name because he was so far gone.

A string of curse words so foul it made me wince poured from his mouth as he struggled.

"Why do we do it?" Emmett asked after a while, his voice hoarse and strained. "Why do we resist?"

I heard his thoughts and it broke my heart.

He was so far from the man he was just minutes ago before he'd done this… Before his first human.

"It's… just… so… _good_." He spoke, absolutely blood drunk as he looked back up at me with brilliant vermillion eyes.

I shivered.

Energy coursed through his veins and strength like he'd had the moment he woke up filled his every fiber. We were meant for human blood. That's when we were at our strongest…

I understood the temptation. I processed it in his thoughts. He already wanted another.

His throat was a fiery furnace, forging nightmarish desires of death and destruction.

It was tantalizing.

"Because they're _people_, Emmett. People with lives and families and hopes and dreams… We can't just…"

He sat back on his heels like a deflated balloon looking around at the travesty, realizing he was only to blame for half of it.

His eyes fixated on the little girl's blonde hair splayed like a cloud through the grass. He took in her hollow cheeks and chapped white lips. I noticed she was skeletal, her skin looking thinly stretched over her bones. The entire family had skeletal looking bodies.

"It was mercy." Emmett mumbled.

"No. It's…" I started, but he wasn't listening.

He stared right at the little girl with big blue eyes that were forever closed now.

"In this rotten Depression, it was mercy." Emmett countered. "They were starving to death. Slow. Awful. Painful… I made it quick."

Emmett was talking like a monster. His brilliant red eyes registered the hunting knife and the scene that in just a few minutes more would've looked much the same…

They would've all been dead anyway.

He just sped along the process.

I couldn't even argue with him.

"Her own _mother_ was going to kill her. Put her out of her misery." Emmett observed in a ghostly tone.

"It was mercy." Emmett mumbled as he stood and looked over the scene around him.

He looked at that little girl, the mother that was just a little older than we were, her husband, and the baby boy that was once in the mother's lap but was now strewn lifeless across the bloodied grass.

He saw their faces and imagined their lives. He thought of their hardships. He empathized in a real, connected way.

This was progress toward not hunting humans - just like Carlisle reminded me.

_Empathy_…

Emmett picked up the hunting knife, noting the stab wound to the little boy's stomach.

It was a baby… Just a baby.

"Mercy, Edward." Emmett countered, turning the knife this way and that in his hands, his bright red eyes fixated on the blood that stained its sheath. "It was mercy."

He wrapped his fingers around the knife, squeezing with the intent to cut his own hand, but this was impossible. Like the consistency of warm butter, the knife molded under Emmett's fingers until it disintegrated into a liquid looking metal swirl.

I started to wordlessly clean up the scene. We'd have to dispose of the bodies.

"She was having another baby." Emmett nodded toward the woman without looking at her. "Another mouth to feed…"

I looked over, noting the roundness of her stomach that betrayed her delicate condition.

It made me remember what it was like to be a human and feel nauseous as I noticed this fact. I could've passed out if I was a human.

This was hellish, barbaric, terrifying… and I could barely stand to stay here a second longer.

A child… A woman… An unborn baby…

Emmett's eyes still fixated on the knife he molded and twisted in his hands like putty.

"It was mercy, Edward…" He repeated again to me, frowning as we began our cover up of the horror scene.

I decided not to speak as I followed the dark trail of his mind, gruesomely disposing of the bodies of a family.

While we worked in silence, his mind was flashing like train lights in the dark. It was mostly nonsensical pictures, memories, and powerful emotions without a visual companion.

I only saw glimpses of himself amongst the monstrosity of being a newborn vampire, but I saw what I needed to see to bring him back between the flashes. He was experiencing a memory dump of his human life now that this part of his brain opened at the thought of empathy.

_Bless us, O Lord, and these, Thy gifts, which we are about to receive from Thy bounty. Through Christ, our Lord. Amen._

_Emmett's back was ruddy and tanned from the unforgiving Southern sun. He wore his work overalls off his shoulders because he wasn't trying to be civilized. Not in this heat. The fabric had hardened because it was caked with dirt and dust. He wiped his sweating brow with the back of his calloused hands, dirt from the land he toiled perpetually under his fingernails. _

_Hunger pain was clawing at his stomach like a rabid animal and it was so bad it radiated through the entirety of his entire body._

_He looked down into the dusty barren ground, leaning into his shovel. _

_All he seemed to see was brown. It was ever-present. _

_Everything was brown. His lungs were filled with dust. _

_His eyes drifted up to the horizon and now he saw red. Red, curly, fiery hair on a little girl no more than seven. _

_She looked like I'd imagine a feral child raised by wolves would look, though Emmett's memory regarded her as nothing short of his definition of utter royalty and beauty. _

_Caroline._

_Her dress was soiled, stained, and full of holes. She didn't wear shoes on her bleeding, grimy feet. Her cheeks were dusted with dirt and her blue eyes had lost their color. Now, they were a dusty color too. Her lips were white and peeling with dehydration. _

_She had a stick around her hunched, narrow shoulders with rusted buckets of dirty water weighing each end. _

_Emmett whistled at her, a smile erupting on his face that betrayed his pain. She looked up, color seeming to enter her face as she met his gaze._

_Then, just as fast as it came, the color left and she collapsed into dust._

_Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May the soul of the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace._

_With the power of thunder rolling and a brilliant flash of lightning, Emmett was arguing heatedly with a man about a head shorter than him, but with very similar dark hair and dark eyes. _

_This was Emmett's father._

_Emmett was roaringly drunk, the world spinning and turning rapidly, too fast for him to keep up. _

_All there was was pain._

_His father pushed on Emmett's chest with fervor so Emmett toppled over in his drunkenness down into the mud, flat on his back. He stood back up defiantly spitting on the muddy ground at his father's feet only to get pushed right back down into the mud._

_A girl with the same raven black hair as Emmett's was sobbing uncontrollably in the muggy humidity, and even the bugs seemed to buzz lazily under the heat. _

_The young girl Emmett knew as his twin sister Dorothy had a little round belly on her skeletal frame but was now prematurely empty of the out-of-wedlock abomination._

_Was it mercy? Emmett's mother and father had fervently insisted that the baby had been an abomination of God. A punishment for sin. _

_Now with the pain Dorothy was in, she more than atoned._

_She was on shaky knees in the dirt floor of a lean-to surrounded by three other girls doting on her, petting her, and giving her any sort of comfort they could. _

_The shack seemed to have been designed for animals, but they'd all died of starvation last winter. _

_Now the remaining McCarty children were the animals living there, and with each passing day they looked more and more feral. _

_One of the youngest McCarty girls, Annie May, affectionately picked lice out of Dorothy's long black hair while she cried. _

_Emmett's mother was wordlessly washing the blood out of the back of Dorothy's dress thinking this couldn't have just been God's will. _

_This was his wrath._

_Now, Emmett knelt into the dust, scooping Dorothy up in his arms. She cried out in pain before she buried her head in his shoulder as he carried her to the rusting silver basin of dirty water. _

_She had on her dress and boots, but Emmett still lowered her into the cool water. In a sad baptism of sorts, he cupped his hands to pour water over her head of raven black hair._

_Again Emmett was digging, this time it was a torrential downpour of rain, and this time there was nothing but black. _

_Things were darker. Everything was black. _

_Emmett's father's black hair was sticking to his head and rain dripped off his furrowed brow over his black eyes. He stood with his arms crossed as he stood over Emmett; the hole was getting deeper and deeper, and Emmett was getting lower and lower under his relentless gaze. _

_Then, Emmett crawled out of the hole to make room for the coffin. _

_He stood over his father in a sort of dark challenge before they both looked out onto the empty field, flooded, and barren. _

_Nothing could grow in this desolate land, but somehow in spite of it all, and by some cruel dark twist on a miracle… Emmett had._

Time elapsed in a sharp, lurch now and darkness surrounded the memory like I was looking through a key hole onto the scene.

"Emmett?" I started, still not able to decipher all that had rushed through his mind, like a faucet let run free.

It cut off now, absolute radio silence in his mind as he looked back at me.

He was in there.

"Emmett, we have to go home." I said.

_Home._

This set off a little avalanche in his thoughts.

"I don't want to." Emmett gritted his teeth, snarling at me.

"Yes, Emmett… You do." I argued with him.

I could see the war in his thoughts.

"Carlisle will forgive you." I said, thinking this was what the theme of those flashes of vision had been from his human life.

"No, he won't." Emmett shook his head, dismissively. "Because I'm not sorry."

He turned his back to me, but I saw in his thoughts this was only half true.

I just had to keep digging.

He was smoldering. I dared not reach out, but I approached slowly.

He growled, lowering his chin to threaten me.

"I don't like your stupid rules." Emmett spat. "We're _vampires_. I'm only doing what I am _designed_ to do."

"But, it doesn't have to be that way." I challenged, knowing a part of him no matter how small agreed with me. "And that's not why Carlisle changed you. That's not why Rosalie brought you to us, and…"

He didn't say anything. He just stood his ground.

I heard the question in his mind I wasn't the one to answer.

_Then why?_

Rosalie would have to answer that one.

"Come on." I urged.

"No." He protested. "I'm not going back."

"You need to at least tell the others what you've decided." I pushed him. "Then you can be on your way."

"Fine."

"You have to tell Rosalie." I let the final blow linger in the air.

He clenched his teeth, growling like he was fighting something. Within his mind, it was a war zone, but her name in his mind was like a bomb.

It had obliterated most everything else going on. Even the monster within was no match for the sound of her name.

It rang in his mind and through his ears until he shook his head.

I could tell he needed to see her. He wouldn't be able to leave once he saw her face.

At least that's what I hoped. Eventually, he calmed down enough to walk with an alarmingly cold space between me back toward our house. His head was down and his hands were in his pockets.

Emmett's thoughts shifted quickly and back and forth between monstrosity and humanity. Even though he was an open book, his thoughts were scrambled and illegibly incoherent.

I didn't know what was going to happen. I couldn't say anything for certain.

His mind was a tangle.

As Emmett bounded up to the back porch, I opened the door and prepared myself.

Selfishly, I was concerned about Carlisle's own view of me. I had proven I wasn't worthy.

Rosalie sensed us.

Undoubtedly, she smelled the human blood on him…

It was hard to miss.

I heard her close her book. Her mind was scarily quiet.

_What happened?_ Rosalie called to me in her thoughts with desperation.

I couldn't even see her eyes, but already I felt her punishing icy glare.

As Emmett and I rounded the corner, I was met face to face with her.

"Edward?" Rosalie asked aloud now, her amber eyes filled with unreadable emotions as they darted between Emmett and I.

"Where's Carlisle?" I asked her evenly, though I knew the answer right after I'd asked.

I heard him move in concern at the sound of Rosalie's voice.

"In his study." Rosalie said, struggling to keep her voice even as she looked at Emmett in what could only be described as sheer horror.

_EDWARD!_ She screamed at me in her head, her eyes widening and taking in Emmett's disheveled appearance.

She panicked like a mother that had found her child in disarray after a weekend excursion with its extended family. If vampires could have a panic attack, Rosalie would've had one in this moment.

It was beyond conspicuous what he'd done even though he still avoided her eyes.

"Emmett?" She addressed him directly now, her voice rising in pitch slightly.

He didn't answer her call, but I watched her voice melt him.

"Are you all right?" She breathed a question I hadn't expected from her.

No condemnation was present in her tone, just.… _concern_.

Now, he looked up at her.

She took in his brilliant red eyes, a silent pained hitch in her breath.

Her hands twitched ever so slightly as they stayed cupped in front of her in those perfect white gloves.

I half imagined she'd shock us all and reach out for him, but she didn't. She just rethreaded her fingers within her own, and stayed distant.

Her voice was slowly pulling him back out, but it was still a deep, murky mud to sift through to find his true self under all this.

I noticed Emmett and Rosalie's eyes met for a long lingering moment as both of their thoughts darted and twisted around one another's but there was no intention to share their burdens.

Neither one of them would break first.

He broke her heart before he turned his back on her wordlessly and followed me toward Carlisle's study.

We drug our feet like naughty school children going to the head master's office only this was so _so_ much worse.

I tried to maintain a cool expression as I knocked on the door to Carlisle's study.

His thoughts made it obvious he knew what we were going to tell him.

Emmett clenched his teeth, and I heard a tiny voice in his mind that didn't want to disappoint Carlisle. The entanglement of his thoughts about Carlisle as a father figure danced between the desire to please, the habit to rebel, and the instinct to revel in his monstrosity apart from any human tendencies toward bonding.

As the door opened and Carlisle met Emmett's new red eyes, he didn't shrink down from them though he knew what they symbolized.

"Come in." Carlisle spoke evenly before putting his hand on Emmett's shoulder in a gesture of solidarity.

Emmett's muscles tensed just slightly at the affection. He expected nothing like the reaction he received.

Carlisle's thoughts were pure and patient with Emmett.

This confused Emmett more than his own mind did.

Then, Carlisle looked over at me.

"Let Emmett and I talk alone for a moment, Edward." Carlisle dismissed me aloud, but let his eyes of unconditional love rest on me enough to communicate his thoughts and true feelings.

He wasn't disappointed in me. He couldn't be.

He understood my pain and discouragement. He'd shockingly even gone through it with Esme.

I nodded, turning from the room but not feeling any more absolved of my sins especially with Rosalie still looming.

I exhaled as I heard Emmett begin the confession to Carlisle just as the door shut behind me.

Emmett's voice was uncharacteristically low, almost silent, and he spoke void of all emotion.

Carlisle was too good for this world. He spoke to Emmett with unconditional absolution and an open heart.

I retreated from the room, my chest still feeling tight, when I was met with Rosalie's icy expression.

"How could you?" She accused in a heartbroken breath.

Her thoughts were assaulting.

"Rosalie, you don't understand…" I tried to reason with her, but I knew it was no use.

"No. Edward,_ you_ don't understand." Rosalie was on fire.

I couldn't read her thoughts because all of them were so overwhelmingly loud.

Then, I caught something important.

A pattern.

Flashes of human memory - a _baby_…

A distant echo of baby talk… Dimples… Dark, curly hair…

A bear… Emmett… The indention of a dimple on his cheek as he grimaced in pain…

She shut herself off to me quickly, but I'd seen enough to know what she was afraid of.

She was afraid that this had darkened him… His light, his goodness… She was afraid I'd ruined him…

More than all of that though, she was afraid he'd never been _good_ in the first place…

She didn't know him… But, she perceived such _innocence_ in him it was astounding - if not a little _naive_…

I felt the blame heavy on my chest.

I softened and motioned for her to come outside with me on the back porch and shockingly, she complied.

Her thoughts were mostly blank as she tried to calm them, but I saw flashes of violence and fear and I heard screams.

She was imagining the worst, but even that wasn't scratching the surface of what had really happened.

Emmett and Carlisle were talking too low for Rosalie to hear.

She couldn't be prepared for this…

My stomach dropped.

As Rosalie floated like a ghost out the back door, she sat down on the back steps, wrapping her arms over her knees like a human would do if they were cold.

She looked childish and vulnerable.

She was worried, and she dropped her forehead to her knees.

I sat down next to her wordlessly.

We remained this way for quite some time.

She thought exclusively in French.

"He's thinking about leaving, Rosalie." I prepared her before I said anything else.

That was in fact, the worst of it and I decided it best to lead with this.

It hit her like a speeding train.

She hadn't been ready for that. Nothing could have prepared her.

She looked out on the horizon, gathering her composure.

Her mind was an open wound now, pouring with pain before she stitched it up like Dr. Frankenstein. She hid her vulnerability masterfully, but there was still a festering scar.

I wasn't fooled.

"Well, all right." She clenched her jaw, sitting up straight and with sickeningly perfect posture to her defiant chin.

Her thoughts didn't betray her, but I knew it was just like an avalanche, just one inch of ice had to melt for the rest of it to come tumbling down.

But, she wasn't melting today.

"You'd be all right with that?" I tested.

"He doesn't answer to me." She answered diplomatically, but still avoided the question.

I sighed.

"Rosalie… You can make him stay if that's what you want." I told her, knowing she needed to be reminded of her power in this situation.

"What makes you think that?" She remained icy, looking down at her hands that were perfectly pristine in her white gloves.

She wanted me to tell her that he loved her, but she also dreaded hearing it.

Her mind was a confusing place in this.

She was playing games. I was impatient with her irritating pig headedness.

"Because he should've died Rosalie, but _you_ didn't let that happen." I pushed just as far as I'd imagine I needed to.

She pushed back.

"He _should've_ died? Who are _you_ to decide that, Edward?" Rosalie asked sharply.

She was immediately offended.

"I just meant… it was _natural_ for him to die." I clarified though she already knew my meaning. "But, you…"

"Is that why you let him do this? You're getting back at _me_?" Rosalie didn't misinterpret my intentions, she was just being ridiculous and challenging.

God, she was difficult.

I'd had it.

"No, Rosalie. You know that's not it." I sighed exasperatedly.

"You're punishing _me _by playing with human lives and his eternal morality." She scoffed.

"No! You're just the only one that knows why in God's name you wanted to change him in the first place." I shouldn't have lashed out, but I did.

Rosalie challenged me with her gaze, keeping her thoughts in perfect control as she closed herself off to me.

"_Carlisle_ made the decision." Rosalie narrowed her eyes, using my devotion and admiration of Carlisle against me.

She diverted the responsibility, but also denied her true thoughts and intentions. She was running away…

"Because_ you_ asked it of him! He couldn't deny you!"

"Carlisle would never deny you anything. No one would. Because we _can't _live with your misery." I corrected.

"That's not my problem."

"Yes, but _Emmett_ is. _He_ is your problem, Rosalie!"

Rosalie frowned at this and I knew she was calculating another way to lash out at me so I interrupted her.

"You've got to be the most _selfish_ person I've ever met." I growled. "You've been nothing but miserable and you hate this life _so much_… But still _you_ did this to him."

She had damned him to an eternity in hell to satisfy a selfish whim of hers. It hit her right in the solar plexus, the gravity of the situation.

"Lower. Your. Voice. You. Vile. Snake." Rosalie spoke through tight teeth, her eyes narrow.

This hit her where it hurt so she retaliated.

Through the ice, anger…

Rosalie and I had a distant mutual agreement to be civil for Carlisle and Esme's sake, but all civility had been shattered as we glared at each other in burning hatred.

Her steely exterior did little to reveal the turmoil her mind was in though. I heard it rushing like a white water rapid, unable to focus on anything because of my own rage at her.

"Miss Rosalie?"

Neither of us had heard him approach; we were both too busy being awful to one another.

Nothing but panic and shame rolled through Rosalie's thoughts.

She hadn't wanted him to see this nasty part of her. She thought that's why he'd resorted to the distance of using her proper name.

I clenched my jaw.

The distance in his thoughts was for an entirely different reason. He didn't feel worthy of addressing her as an equal.

_Don't leave me alone with him._ Rosalie thought loudly and desperately at me.

I barely moved my chin, letting her know as much as I despised her in this moment, I still would do this with her.

Emmett stood in the doorway vibrating with nervous energy.

Rosalie stood to her feet, smoothing her dress and dismissing the previous casual seated position she'd been in.

Their eyes met.

He was worried about her. He sensed her displeasure, misinterpreting it to be something he'd directly caused.

"I did somethin' you won't like." He admitted to her in a mumble.

His childish confession was honest and open, much like the rest of him.

His accent was thick when his voice was filled with emotions.

He was fully in his mind now, all thoughts of leaving long gone as he stepped forward onto the back porch with us.

I exhaled.

He looked over at me.

I nodded him forward, also in this way letting him know I hadn't told Rosalie anything.

"It's… pretty awful. You can't even… imagine." Emmett prepped her, his brilliant red eyes staring into hers now.

Rosalie didn't flinch away as I imagined she would.

She transformed, an immediate metamorphosis at the look of conflict in his eyes.

He took a deep inhale, intoxicated by her, but now intensely wrought with thoughts of inferiority in her presence.

I willed them to dissipate.

"I can take it." Rosalie answered his unspoken words as only she could, not looking away from his eyes.

At the sight of him and sound of pain in his voice, something new was budding inside of her thoughts that I didn't even think she realized or acknowledged.

She didn't want him to be alone in this. She was taking on his burdens.

She was learning what it was like to care for someone else…

Rosalie surprised me more in this moment than I'd ever imagine she could've. Just his presence had obliterated her excessive selfishness as she responded to his need.

Their eyes stayed hopelessly lost in one another's as he told her everything and I mean everything. He held no gruesome detail back.

It wasn't in his nature.

His honesty did little to shake Rosalie. In fact, it almost… _refreshed_ her.

No one had ever been this candid with her. They'd always cut her off from honesty, imagining nothing should be going on in her pretty head but pretty thoughts.

Emmett's view of her was shockingly different than anyone else's. To him, she wasn't a 'lady of society' she was just… _Rosalie_.

Her thoughts remained startlingly calm, and even though I watched her eyes after he'd tell her something especially horrendous, she didn't flinch. She didn't turn away.

She listened to every tale of brutality, sensing that he wasn't exactly sorry for any of it.

Even though he wasn't sorry, Rosalie's perfection and presence had him thinking he ought to be.

When he was finished and it was hauntingly silent, he communicated a need for her without anything but his gaze.

"I'd… I'd like to stay and… try to be better though." He drug the toe of his boot across the ground in front of him finally looking down and away from her eyes.

He was unwilling, but the look in her eyes had him thinking he could do it. If that's what she wanted.

"You can." Rosalie said calmly and evenly in a blanket statement.

She was giving him permission to stay and encouragement to be a better man. She genuinely believed it was possible for him, and this alone proved the growth in her heart.

Then, he did something thoughtless because it took me by surprise.

It never even ran through his mind before he did it.

It was instinctual.

"Thank you. " He exhaled as he put his arms around Rosalie, pulling her into his chest in an embrace.

I heard her mind go haywire and I immediately grew concerned.

Rosalie kept her arms stiff and shocked by her side at his contact, completely frozen. Her head barely cleared his shoulder at full height in her heels, but now, she ducked her head defensively so it was centered on where his heart would've beat.

Emmett was pretty much thoughtless, just relying on Rosalie like a candle in a dark corridor. I looked on this exchange with wide eyes and anticipation for how on earth Rosalie would respond to this unsolicited and unexpected affection.

I heard even Carlisle and Esme shift their weight so we were in view from the window in the living room.

Then, after barely a human second had passed of their embrace, Rosalie wrinkled her nose and pushed him away, smoothing her dress and looking away from him.

He stood a few feet back from her now, his eyes darting over her because he didn't understand the horror struck look on her face. He couldn't imagine showing connection, approval, friendship, love, happiness, satisfaction, trust, or any of it without physicality. Every emotion solicited a physical response to him. Even his negative emotions, he assigned a physical response though of course that looked a whole lot scarier.

Emmett was tragically physical, and Rosalie… well, that was her undoing.

It made my stomach turn as I was let on to this insight.

I almost believed whatever hope there had been for something to happen between the two of them, it was now completely gone. This was a wedge too great to conquer between them.

Rosalie's eyes were wide and purposefully away from all of us. She was shaking like a leaf, too small for the human eye and even a vampiric eye untrained to notice how she trembled.

Her standards for him were impossibly high; killing humans had been forgivable, but this…

This she would punish him for.


	6. Blinding

WOW! I don't deserve your kind words, but I appreciate your encouragement and love! Here's a new extended chapter! Thank you so much for your reviews! I LOVE hearing your thoughts and appreciate your time sharing them with me. It makes my day to see what you've written.

This chapter is in Rosalies POV again and I loved writing a conversation between she and Carlisle that I imagined was necessary given the circumstances.

This chapter also deals with one of the biggest things I was curious about in the Twilight series: Edward spent time away from Esme and Carlisle hunting exactly the kinds of men that would end up killing Rosalie... I can't imagine this conversation never came up between them, and I can't imagine Rosalie wasn't invested in _some_ way in the thought that if it had been a different place or a different time, Edward would've killed Royce and those men... Edward hunted murderers and rapists and lowlives, but found absolute morality right before it would've changed _everything_ for Rosalie...

Thank you so much for reading! Enjoy!

* * *

_**Blinding**_

_Seems that I have been held, in some dreaming state_  
_A tourist in the waking world, never quite awake_  
_No kiss, no gentle word could wake me from this slumber_  
_Until I realize that it was you who held me under_

_Felt it in my fist, in my feet, in the hollows of my eyelids_  
_Shaking through my skull, through my spine and down through my ribs_

_No more dreaming of the dead as if death itself was undone_  
_No more calling like a crow for a boy, for a body in the garden_

_No more dreaming like a girl so in love, so in love_

* * *

**Rosalie** \- _Timing is Everything_

For two weeks I scrubbed my skin again and again and again, fixating on the idea that I could scrub him off of me.

If I could cry, I would've figured it out by now, but currently I was tearless and silent as the cold water ran down my back under my millionth shower in two weeks.

Again, I scrubbed my skin until I imagined I'd start a fire with the friction.

I hadn't known how to process or react to Emmett blindsiding me like that, so I retreated into myself to try and come up with a plan. I couldn't be caught without my defenses up. I wouldn't let myself be taken by surprise with him ever again.

I hadn't expected him reveling in such darkness after his first human kills, then when he put his arms around me, it was solidified that… _I really didn't know him_.

And this terrified me.

Emmett was a stranger that I had naively recognized as familiar, but now it became evident the distance between us that he had stupidly tried to bridge at the most inopportune time.

I expected him to know better, but honestly… Maybe he didn't.

Well, I couldn't forget that easily.

However, _I_ hadn't made him suffer.

It wasn't me.

That was _Carlisle_. He and Edward had tortured Emmett so I didn't even have to.

Carlisle had thought it was a good idea to let Emmett get thirsty after his last human kills and "clean" his system…. He had a theory so naturally, he'd been testing it by letting Emmett get r_avenously_ thirsty, and I couldn't stand to see him like this so I didn't even open my door.

There was no privacy in this godforsaken hell, so in my own suffering upstairs in the fortress of my tower, I was a distant witness to Emmett's suffering too.

Carlisle and Edward had gone back to square one retraining Emmett to hunt only animals. After what happened, it was intensely difficult to rein Emmett back in, and Carlisle had insisted on more time…

He and Edward had tried unsuccessfully to get me to open my door and help them with Emmett, but Edward knew my thoughts enough to know this wasn't going to happen.

It wasn't that I'd left him to suffer without me for his own punishment, though I did think he deserved it because I hated him for his unsolicited advances.

It was mostly that Emmett was too dangerous for me to be around when he was that thirsty. Emmett was impossibly thirstier because he knew what he was missing now. He wanted blood so badly it transformed him into exactly what I'd feared he was at his change.

He was a monster.

He was _starving _so he'd gotten wilder and more unpredictable…

He was absolutely out of control.

I couldn't watch them starve him, but even under my constant stream of water, I still _heard_ his misery. In an odd way, I reveled in my own suffering because I couldn't bear to hear him suffering alone so I got thirstier myself, not even leaving my room to hunt.

However much my throat burned though sent me further and further into moping depression at how much I hated this life.

I felt my own thirst and got drearily melancholic.

_I _could control the smoldering oven of my throat and masochistically push myself, but Emmett couldn't. He was _desperate_, begging, and pleading with Carlisle and Edward and Esme.

It was heart wrenching to hear him beg like that…

Then, within the next breath he was horrifying, monstrous and threatening to kill them.

He was like an addict in withdrawal, vibrating with energy and despair for the one thing he wanted more than anything.

Then finally, Emmett broke.

It was like bending a pencil over and over and over, pushing until the wood finally split. It was a clean quick snap, nothing showy or dramatic. Just a final, immediate change.

"_Please_." Emmett's raspy, tired voice was full of hopelessness, but this time it was cognizant _real_ desperation in his tone that suggested he was presently in his mind and asking instead of the monster within.

Then, they were gone, and they'd stayed gone for over a week.

I presently sat down under the water stream again, bringing my knees to my chest.

I wondered how many gallons of water I'd let pour over me these past two weeks. How many showers and baths had I taken?

Impossibly, Emmett's scent _still _lingered on my skin, or at least my imagination put it there and I was overwhelmed.

It was uninvited and looming.

_He wouldn't get out of my head. _

My breath caught in my throat, and I ducked my head between my knees as if this could shake him, closing my eyes as the water beat down on the back of my neck.

All I saw was him… With those awful red eyes. I felt him everywhere and it was stifling.

The water though felt warm on my skin, even though I'd now turned it to scald. Steam rose off my cold skin at the reaction and I watched it in disgust.

My fingers reached for the drain plug, letting the bathtub fill around me.

I closed my eyes and submerged, loving the sound of the water churning around my ears.

It quieted my senses to almost normal.

I could stay under this heavy water forever.

Then, I heard a light knock at my door but didn't bring my head out from under the water.

Esme would get tired of trying to reach me eventually.

I inhaled all the water I could to try to drown myself, but it didn't work of course. The venom processed the water so my lungs didn't.

There was truly no solace in this life.

The knock gave way to a voice calling for me.

How long had I been under water? Behind my closed eyes, it was now light pink so I knew sunlight now shone through the window. It wasn't night anymore.

It had been at least six hours.

"Rosalie?" Carlisle's voice was calm, collected and even as it always was on the other side of the door.

Now though, it held a tinge of stress.

I sat up from under the water but didn't answer.

"Rosalie." Carlisle repeated my name. "Come downstairs. Now that we're back and things have settled we'd like to discuss something as a family."

A family. I snorted.

He heard me of course and sighed.

I wrapped a towel around myself, my cursed, beautiful body.

"As a coven." He corrected for my sake. "As a group."

"I'm unfit to entertain company." I responded evenly and annoyed.

My thirst made me more irritable, but my depression kept me in check and unable to leave my room even to hunt.

"We'll wait." Carlisle assured.

"Can I speak with you alone first though?" He asked after a moment.

I knew his intentions were nothing but pure and golden and as perfect as he was, but he was still a man and I still distrusted him.

I didn't rush to respond, or to dress myself.

"Rosalie, it's very important." Still he waited at the door.

With my hair still wet, but a cotton house dress on now, I finally opened my door for the very first time in two weeks.

No one had seen me so undone, but I was depressed, Carlisle's presence was looming, and I was anticipating his conversation so I let him in before I'd even fixed my hair or make up.

I heard Emmett stirring downstairs.

He stayed.

Something about this almost bubbled up some happiness, but it quickly flickered out.

Carlisle met my eyes, but I didn't allow him a very long look at me. I floated to sit in front of the mirror, brushing through my perfect golden blonde hair and staring into my eyes to present a distant disinterest in whatever he had to say.

He left the door open, though it was unnecessary. Everyone could hear anyway if they wanted to.

"It's about Emmett." Carlisle began.

I figured as much. I tried not to look interested.

Without a response, Carlisle went on.

"We haven't… _discussed_ his change."

I would've played dumb and asked what there was to discuss, but that seemed ignorant and excessive. Instead, I chose another route.

"We have not." I said, over-pronouncing my words.

"This… Well, changing _Emmett_ was difficult for me." He took a deep breath, and it made me nervous.

Was he trying to make me feel bad?

I continued the brush through my hair again and again focusing on keeping the strokes even. I hoped he wasn't telling me he regretted it.

"Emmett… Well, he was the first one of you that I changed for something other than companionship or…. like with you I passed my own judgement for what I believed was mercy… The brutality of… It was… too…"

I felt my stomach drop to my knees and my throat tightened so I thought it was going to explode.

Carlisle cleared his own taut throat, seeming to retract where he was going with that.

"Rosalie, I changed Emmett for _you_." Carlisle began again, worry and ancient pain that looked to old for his young, immortal face.

"I didn't ask any questions." He expanded.

I clenched my jaw, looking down at the refractions of light on my bottles of my perfume.

He waited, standing behind me in my view of the mirror. He wanted me to thank him, but the words wouldn't leave the bottom of my throat. I couldn't do it.

"I went back on a vow I made to myself after… after _you. _I vowed I'd never again do this to anyone…_" _Carlisle spoke slowly and it was making me nervous. "But, I would do it again and again for you, if that secured you _any_ happiness."

He was trying to prove himself to me. Men did that.

I exhaled.

"With all that said though Rosalie, I changed him without _any _expectations of you." Carlisle's voice was annoyingly soothing.

My stomach churned, but I just nodded.

"I trusted your intuition and your decision making when I changed Emmett." Carlisle expanded. "Now that he's changed and time's moving, I want to remind you of that."

I stopped brushing my hair for a moment.

"I trust you, Rosalie. I know you aren't impulsive. You're very calculated and meticulous, so I know that you have a very good reason for stepping in at his death. I trust whatever that reasoning was, and I don't ever expect you to explain anything to me."

I hated these interventions Carlisle and Esme were always insistent upon.

It was suffocating.

I took a deep breath.

"Very well." I responded the only way I knew - distance.

"I'm here for you if you want to talk, about _any_ of it. I remember when I turned Esme…"

This was different. This was different and he should know that.

He read the displeasure in my expression, and cut himself off.

"I know it's very different, but in many ways it's the same. Esme truly struggled in the beginning too. It absolutely _broke_ my soul to see her lapse, and I saw how hard her journey toward self-control was, and often still is. Emmett is struggling with our lifestyle, and he very well may _always_ struggle, but he's very lucky to have our family to guide and support him in this. He _will_ be able to do this."

"I know." I swallowed.

"But Rosalie, I know he disappointed you." Carlisle directed.

I just nodded wordlessly. Carlisle would ultimately misinterpret my reasoning, but Emmett _did_ disappoint me. Thank God Emmett wasn't Edward, but I did wish before he'd… reached for me like he did, that he'd been able to read my mind. I didn't just dislike it… I _hated_ it.

I think…

All I knew was that I had a pit in my stomach ever since.

I felt _different _now. I felt certainly unsafe around him.

"I know what you're going through." Carlisle tried.

Immediately, I was filled with defensiveness and rage. I was alert and acutely aware of Carlisle now and I felt intruded upon.

He _didn't_ know what I was going through. He had no idea. No one knew. I didn't like people imagining they knew me and all that I experienced. He didn't know me. He knew his idea of me.

Still though, I maintained an icy coolness as I put mascara on my already impossibly black and long eyelashes. I fixated my thoughts on my beauty and maintenance of it as something I could control.

"On top of all of Esme's own struggles in transformation, I was struggling too." Carlisle told me confidentially.

"It was difficult wanting to connect with Esme but feeling like there was this… _separation_ between me and the person Esme was underneath the blood lust." He tried opening up to me in hopes it would make me trust him more. "We were at intensely different spots in our journey. I wanted to know her, to laugh with her, to hear her stories, to tell her mine… But, it took a while for her to be ready for that. I had to be selfless in a way I'd never been before, and extremely patient. But, it was well worth it. "

I was angry Carlisle was making comparisons. Carlisle _knew_ Esme. He already loved her. This with Emmett… Who knew if I could fall in love with him? Maybe he couldn't even fall in love with me.

Is love even what I wanted?

He waited so I knew I had to respond.

"I understand." I breathed.

No doubt he wanted me to open up more, but I couldn't.

I felt like I was being lectured again. But while Edward was self-righteous, Carlisle really was a saint.

"I noticed Emmett tried to connect with you." Carlisle spoke clinically like he was diagnosing an illness.

My hairbrush snapped in my hands. God.

His eyes searched my face seeming to look for my response and reaction to it. He noticed the stress that caused me to forget to wrangle in my cursed vampiric strength.

"That's immense progress for so early in his transformation." Carlisle acknowledged, still trying to read me. "Truly. He wants to know you very badly then. Through all of what his first newborn year entails, he wants to know you. He's trying, Rosalie."

"Yes." I furrowed my brow, keeping my eyes from him, twisting my hair up and back away from my face although I desired only to hide behind it.

In an unconscious way, I knew there was something about wearing my hair off my neck that made me look exceptionally exquisite, and there was the promise of seeing Emmett again.

In this moment though I couldn't acknowledge that unconscious thought. Carlisle made me feel like one of his patients under observation. His eyes were heavy and inquisitive.

If vampires could blush, he would've seen me turn scarlet.

I put on lipstick so I wouldn't have to talk any more, because as distant as I am in most subjects, I am truly unapproachable when it comes to my emotions and my experience of them.

"I trust you and your decisions." He repeated, wanting to make sure I heard this. "And, I changed him for you _without_ stipulation. Obviously, I want you to find… _love_ like Esme and I have, and I have to tell you honestly that I hoped when I changed him that he could be that to you…"

If I could blush, I would have, but I also got intensely angry and defensive. Carlisle read this in my eyes.

"But,_ if_ he isn't, I could never be upset with you for changing your mind because _I_ changed him and _I_ made that call. He will live this life with us or apart from us, but I don't expect anything from you, Rosalie. I take responsibility for changing him."

He kept repeating the phrase so I would hear it.

I just nodded.

"Well, once you're ready, I'd love if you would join us downstairs." Carlisle smiled pleasantly at me. "I think you'll be happy to know that Emmett's a lot more coherent today. He's doing a lot better with our diet and lifestyle choices and he's going to stay and keep trying."

"I'll walk with you." I said as I stood from my vanity and reached for a pair of t-strap heels.

"You look lovely." Carlisle complimented, seeming to think I needed reminding.

I knew.

His compliment filled what otherwise would've been silence, and seemed to appease me. He thought that this would calm the nerves he sensed in me. He complimented me because he felt it was due.

It wasn't really about me.

"Thank you." I responded, all the same as I put on my white gloves and followed him downstairs.

I heard Emmett's anticipatory inhale when he heard my shoes on the stairs. It made my legs feel like a baby giraffe's - awkward and unstable.

I hadn't really seen him in a little over two weeks, since that fateful day.

My stomach felt like it was tingling with soda bubbles. Every single one of my nerve endings was jolting with electricity, and I was drawn, in a trance like desire to find his eyes.

After what seemed like a century, but was really only a second, my wanting eyes got their desire.

I think I hated him now, but he stood as I entered the room, a true gentleman.

"Rosalie." He nodded toward me, having stood from where Edward was teaching him to play chess.

Though his eyes were still a burnt crimson, I was still terrifyingly addicted to having his gaze.

Emmett was unusually chipper, a shocking lightness to him even after all had transpired.

He'd moved on. He was living _presently_.

He didn't dwell. He didn't mourn. He didn't mope. He didn't brood.

Edward had cornered the market on brooding.

Edward raised his gaze to look at me with narrowed eyes after hearing this thought.

I didn't allow him the pleasure of my attention, especially when my eyes were still captive in Emmett's.

"Wow. You're sure a sight." He complimented for the world to hear.

Without shame or apprehension, he openly displayed the inner workings of his mind.

What a way to live.

His smile was unwaveringly confident because he told me this not because he relied on my response.

He didn't have a selfish reason for his compliment. He told me I was beautiful so _I_ would hear it. He told me I was beautiful because it was an important thought that had to be shared, and under his worshipping gaze, I felt… _gorgeous _even standing here in a cotton dress with my hair loosely braided off of my neck.

"Thank you." I breathed, still half hating him.

I mindlessly ran my hand along my neck nervously, watching his eyes follow my fingers before they found my eyes again.

"How's your game going?" I asked, wondering why in God's name I had settled on this lame arrangement of words after so long since I'd seen him.

I could kick myself.

Edward snickered.

"Not so good." Emmett responded easily, exhaling and shrugging his broad shoulders. "But, I'm playing with a mind reader so don't hold it against me."

His competitive nature was evident in the annoyance in his voice.

"I suppose you and I would be more evenly matched." He spoke with challenge, but with a flicker of boyish flirtation in his eyes that still hadn't left mine.

He looked at me in this moment like I was the most intelligent, clever, and competent person he'd ever laid eyes on.

At the slightest twitch at the corner of my mouth, Emmett smiled a beaming smile that seemed to stretch impossibly from ear to ear.

"Come on to the dining room." Carlisle encouraged. "We have something to discuss, then there's plenty of time for Rosalie to beat you at chess."

This discussion seemed ominous, and I half resented him for interrupting the eye contact Emmett and I had maintained for a record amount of time.

Emmett's eyes left mine only to laugh at Carlisle's attempt at a joke. Emmett's uninhibited laugh bubbled up from the depths of his core and overflowed into the room, seeming to make the entire room a little bit brighter.

I still hated him. I was pretty sure.

Maybe it was just my pressing thirst that I maintained as a way to wallow in my melancholy. I hated that my eyes were black. In vanity, they were so much more beautiful golden and I hated Emmett saw me like this.

It was my own damn fault for starving myself in self-pity and sabotage.

"After you." Emmett returned his attention to me.

I realized in the second it left me just how much I craved it.

Now though, I'd have to turn away from his eyes once again.

With my back to him as I walked down the hall, I felt like I was going to jump out of my skin. It made me nervous to have him out of my gaze and his presence was so heavy that it weighed my shoulders down as I made my way to the dining room that now acted as a sort of conference meeting room.

If I had to spend one more second with my back to him, I was going to scream, so I was glad when the threshold opened to the dining room and he appeared by my side.

Now, it was the sight of him that made me nervous.

Esme already sat at the round mahogany table we used only as a prop and for serious discussions such as this one and gave us a little, pleasant smile as she saw us.

Edward sat on one side of her, and Carlisle sat on the other so that Emmett and I would take the remaining seats next to one another.

I opted to sit next to Edward just so I wouldn't feel his eyes so heavily on me across the table.

At this, Edward turned his head to look at me. I narrowed my eyes, but couldn't focus on this too hard when Emmett sat down on my left.

The very aura radiating off of him scalded my entire left side.

I tried not to inhale because his scent would turn my brain to mush.

Cinnamon. Leather. Thyme. Cedar. Tobacco.

All of it. All at once.

It reminded me of being close to him.

My skin felt a strange ghost ache like the blood behind a bruise, and I crossed my arms over my chest.

"A lot has changed in the past couple months." Carlisle said, beginning the state of the union speech and recap as he always did.

This was special though, and it'd been a while since something changed…

"Rosalie, you came back and… you brought a new addition to our family."

Emmett moved and I was acutely aware of it.

He put his arm on the back of my chair, easily, and I felt his eyes on me as he smiled in my direction.

I was using my very best posture so my back wouldn't rest against the back of my chair or more accurately be in close proximity to his arm. I was stifled and angry he was intruding.

Esme's attention was focused on me even though her eyes weren't directly on me.

Emmett was physically bold in a way I wasn't used to, any of us really.

Carlisle even looked over, momentarily distracted before he continued.

"Esme and I have decided, though we of course want your input, that it might be best to move on from this area. With the threat of people recognizing Emmett, and Rosalie, your unexplained appearance, we think it's risky to stay here for much longer."

I knew this was coming.

But to be fair, anyone that recognized Emmett at least wouldn't live to tell about it with the state of his blood lust.

It wasn't that I didn't have any faith in his control… I just _really_ didn't have any faith in his control.

"Edward?" Carlisle turned to him first, expectation in his eyes and a yearning for approval.

Edward was in many ways a younger version of Carlisle. He had been the first Carlisle turned, and took on the role of his right hand man.

Edward was someone Carlisle longed not to disappoint, and would remind Carlisle often of his need for connection, humanity, compassion, and love.

Edward reminded Carlisle that we could be something more than a monster. For different reasons, Edward and Carlisle both pursued a moral betterment to our existence.

They searched for a counter to the curse and thought that their actions could somehow make up for the atrocity that the majority of others of our kind indulged in.

Edward and Carlisle were in a way accountability partners, and Edward inspired Carlisle to continue his moral fight for a better way to exist as we did.

My limbs felt heavy and my eyes dropped down when I realized we all represented something to Carlisle, and while Edward was all that and Esme represented love, I just represented the dark parts of immortality.

I represented the chains and shackles that we're bound by when death won't find us. To Carlisle, I represented the curse of our existence to no longer grow or change to experience life.

I represented the duplicity of what Carlisle did when he thought he was saving us. I represented the punishing captivity, suffocation, internment, oppression, perpetuity, _damnation_…

I represented Carlisle's own darkness…

I was yanked from my reverie when I felt a hand, heavy on my shoulder.

"Rosalie, what do you think?" Emmett asked, his eyes slightly narrowed so I knew he was also asking me what I was lost in thought about.

"Yes." I agreed, his hand feeling heavier and heavier on my shoulder the more time that passed.

I could focus on nothing else and my eyes went down to his fingers, willing them off of me.

I stared at his fingers with enough distaste and remained so tense that he finally got the hint.

But when he unwound his arm from my shoulders and back into his own personal space, I felt a sharp tingling on my skin where he'd left.

I furrowed my brow slightly, still filled with a hollow melancholy over my revelation about Carlisle.

I was beautiful and perfect and I would always be. Though this sounds like a fairytale, it's more like a tragedy.

I would always _be_.

I didn't hear much of what else was said while I wallowed in my despairing thoughts, always so quickly consumed by them, especially when I thirsted. But then, something was said that again pulled me from my own mind and into the present.

"It's overcast most of the year, so I thought… Edward, Rosalie, you might be ready to spend more time around humans, have some _normalcy_?"

"And it would definitely be helpful to have you start in high school so that we might settle for a little longer and no one would ask any questions about our age." Carlisle added.

My eyes widened and I almost smiled.

"Really?" I asked, feeling like a prisoner being given a set of keys.

If I had a heart, it would've been racing.

"If… you feel ready, and this is something you find suitable?" Carlisle asked.

I'd get to go back to school, to be admired and doted on and worshipped and… But more than that, I'd get to watch other girls grow and change and fall in love and be filled with the promises of husbands and babies and houses with blue shutters.

My heart ached in catharsis.

I just nodded.

I felt Emmett's eyes heavy on me, watching me, observing my reaction so I tried to censor it.

"We're going to stop first in Denali for a bit first to finish off the rest of the summer. There's a coven of vampires like us, that abide in our similar lifestyle and diet. We think meeting them and spending some time there hunting and learning from them would be good for your transition, Emmett. If that is still what you desire."

"Yeah, that's fine." Emmett nodded, still not entirely enthused by rules.

I'd never met this other coven either, though Edward and Esme seemed to know who Carlisle was talking about. It was going to be nice to have a change in scenery again, and I'd never seen Alaska.

The cold wouldn't bother me now.

"Tanya is happy to host us, and said she's looking forward to meeting you both." Carlisle nodded toward Emmett and I.

Edward's face twitched only slightly so I imagined there was something to know about this coven. I half wished I hadn't made him hate me so he'd give me information.

Edward looked up at this thought, smug.

I rolled my eyes slowly so no one else would know we'd communicated.

"It's settled then. I'll get things settled at the hospitals then we'll leave for Denali in a week."

"Ah, this was a beautiful little house." Esme sighed dreamily, looking around as she stood from the table.

I watched Emmett's face turn whiter than I'd ever seen as he looked down at his lap, something stirring in his thoughts because it made his thick brow furrow pensively.

Edward was already bolting toward the piano and Esme and Carlisle beginning to strategize our move as they assumed we'd trail behind.

I had planned on it as well, but Emmett wasn't following and my legs weren't working seeing him like this. I couldn't leave.

Emmett was heavy laden, and I guessed it had something to do with leaving his family behind.

Emmett put his elbows on the table running his hands through his hair and twisting pieces of it while he bounced his knees nervously.

I should've asked him if he was all right.

I lingered for a second longer, concerned, before he spoke.

"We're going, really?"

"Yes." I nodded.

"I just… worry about my family when we get too far away." Emmett admitted to me after a deep breath, darkness in his eyes and voice, but a determined optimism to his demeanor.

"I know." I gulped, trying to muster any empathy I had deep down in my blackened, icy soul. "But, they'll be okay, Emmett."

I didn't know this. I just said it in hopes that it would return his lightness and those dimples I was addicted to.

"No. They won't." He said definitely.

"Without me, there's no way they'll survive." Emmett tried to suggest, passion and worry heating up his voice. "We… didn't have much money…"

I tried to assure him I would listen as I sat back down in the chair beside him.

He turned his knees so we were closer and he shifted his weight in his elbow.

"I was the only boy, and they relied on me to provide for them and…" Emmett fixated. "Now, that's not to say my mama and my sisters aren't strong. They are, but… the _land_… that's back breaking work and they can't… They can't do that. They can't hunt or…"

I saw in his eyes that it was beyond _can't_. He didn't even want them to have to.

"What about your father?" I asked, half out of curiosity and half just out of impulse.

"He's…" Emmett exhaled through his nose. "Not _reliable_ about that sort of thing."

He chose his words carefully, not wanting to say anything too damaging but his eyes were open books. There was no love there.

"_I_ took care of them." He clarified. "I was responsible for them."

I swallowed, hating the pain I saw on his face.

"And my sister… my sister, Dorothy…" He was tortured by the new thought of her helplessness without him. "She wasn't well when I left…"

This pain seemed to be worse than the pain of transformation because I couldn't see what was the answer on the other side. I couldn't see why it was worth it.

"I'm sorry, Emmett." I said honestly, wishing there was a magic word I could say to make it all right.

But, there wasn't.

"Was it hard for you?" He asked. "To leave your family, all of it?"

My chest felt tight.

"Not really." I could only think of the burning resentment I still held for my parents.

It was irrational and undeserving resentment. I mean, I would've probably pursued Royce King's attention even without their push toward him.

He was the most eligible bachelor in town and I wanted to be Queen. It wasn't my parents' fault what happened to me, but it was a lot easier to blame them than blame myself.

Emmett stood with a nod of finality as I paused, then gave me a little smile as he put on a brave face.

"Now, about that game." Emmett suggested as he stood.

Again, he didn't fixate or brood. It could've been due to his easily distracted mind as a newborn or it could've been just a staple of his true personality.

Either way, he didn't fixate on things he couldn't change.

"Of course." I stood after him, following to appease his competitive challenge.

"Now, don't take it easy on me just because I'm still pretty new at this." He raised an eyebrow with a rascally smile, sitting on one side of the board while I sat across from him on the other.

"I wouldn't dream of it." I returned his smile lightly, but I was still wary and careful after what happened with his unsolicited advances.

He set the board incorrectly, and I bit my lip, amused until he figured it out.

"Well damn, if this is any clue as to how I'm 'bout to play." Emmett laughed freely and unbridled.

I couldn't help but smile a little.

"Shit…. I mean… Sorry. Sorry, I really didn't mean to curse in front of you." He made a face.

"Can we just play?" I rolled my eyes with the threat of a giggle in my throat.

"Yes, yes we can. Sorry, I'm focused now." He gazed down at the board, calculating his first move.

"But, _you _are still quite distracting." He playfully accused me with a grin as he finally decided on strategy.

I was flattered and I hid behind my eyelashes.

Esme and Carlisle had both become an audience to our game, but it just made me more nervous especially the way they looked at me when he flirted with me.

I was mortified, so I got quiet.

Emmett lost the first game which made him insist on two out of three, but when he lost three games in a row, he insisted he needed a break to rethink strategy.

"I think you are just bad at chess." Edward suggested, teasing him.

Emmett shot up to his feet and opened his mouth to say something, then rethought it.

"You know what… You're probably right." He nodded with a little laugh, deciding on not tackling Edward and ruining Esme's furniture.

"Good decision." Edward chuckled at him, confirming exactly what I'd read to be true. He had planned on tackling Edward. "See, the newborn vampire's making progress."

"Oh shut your trap." Emmett narrowed his eyes, undoubtedly wanting to rethink that tackle.

I would've.

Instead, Emmett gave Edward's shoulders a tight squeeze at the piano before he reached over him and played a slow, awkward portion of _Ave Maria._

Edward turned toward Emmett with an anticipatory smile, letting him have the reach for the piano to encourage him to continue, but it was obvious Emmett didn't know any more than that.

"Where did you learn that?" Esme asked, charmed.

"My Ma played all the time. Her piano was the only thing she brought with her when we moved. She always tried to make me be civilized and sit still and learn, but I _obviously_ didn't." Emmett laughed, but I saw darkness enter his eyes at the mention of his mother. "I just… remembered that was her favorite."

He was saddened immediately.

"You could learn if you wanted." Edward slid to the side, offering the bench.

"I couldn't sit still human. I especially can't sit still _now_." Emmett laughed.

"But you _learn_ faster now." Edward seemed to protest, his hands seeming to itch to finish the song as he danced through a couple more notes to finish the phrase of music Emmett had .

"I wouldn't even learn for _my own mother,_ Edward." Emmett chuckled.

"I'll leave the music business to y'all." Emmett waved his hand over Edward and I. "I prefer listenin' anyways."

He was heavier now, thinking about his family and it was felt by everyone in the room.

It weighed on my own chest so much I began to feel suffocated. I oddly longed to ease his pain, but only time and distance from human memories could do that.

"We've got lots of time to learn new things." Carlisle encouraged as a redirection.

There seemed to be something unspoken between the three men as they exchanged a glance. No doubt something brewing in their bond on those many hunting trips.

"I mean, you've been around for three hundred years. I'm sure you've got to know _everything _by now." Emmett's eyes went wide, changing his focus to Carlisle's many tales of adventures.

Carlisle laughed.

"I still learn something new every day." Carlisle shrugged. "Because the world's changing every day."

Change. I was reminded of the stifling stagnation of my existence again and again, but Emmett was enchanted and distracted by Carlisle's stories though, so he immediately asked about another of Carlisle's unbelievable tales.

Emmett fixated on the strangest details and asked such childishly curious but observant and intentional questions.

It amused us all.

"When Edward left shortly after I changed Esme I…" Carlisle said

"Wait, Edward left?" I was the one asking the questions now, interrupting Carlisle's story.

This was too interesting not to note. Perfect Edward had left this family too.

Edward frowned.

"Aren't you thirsty?" Edward asked, and just the acknowledgement made my throat's furnace roar to fiery life.

My sheer force of will is the only thing that allowed me to shake my head.

Emmett looked over at me, his own eyes seeming to get a shade darker as he regarded mine's black onyx color.

I _was_ thirsty…

But, I was even more stubborn in the face of Edward's story.

"It was only for a short while and for what seemed good reason at the time." Edward responded, telling me that of course I had misunderstood. "From 1927 to 31."

It was longer than I'd been gone though.

"What made you go out on the open road all on your own?" Emmett asked him, seeming to think that Edward might be able to connect with his own struggles on wanting another diet choice…

I hoped Edward's story wouldn't be encouraging to Emmett and cause him to leave and digress.

Edward ignored my thought and continued.

"Well, Carlisle and Esme had found each other and… were so happy, and I was… struggling with the point of this lifestyle a bit at the time." Edward explained, seeming to want Emmett to know he wasn't alone in his fight against blood lust so he gave him a little supported smile.

I was laser focused, unable to believe that good, moral, perfect Edward had ever lapsed.

He caught my eyes now, seeming to challenge what I thought about his flimsy morality.

"I hunted humans, but I only hunted the worst kinds. Since I could read thoughts, I carried out a sort of vigilante justice with my hunt. I only fed on murderers, thieves, domestic abusers, rapists…."

My stomach dropped.

"How _noble_ of you." I sneered at him.

Edward's eyes met mine.

_Where were you then? _I thought loudly at him, clenching my jaw and remaining icy.

"Rosalie, you don't understand." We fought about something unsaid in front of Emmett and the rest.

I couldn't understand because it was beyond comprehension. I was hurt, and my venom boiled in my veins in defensive rage.

I wanted to kill something…

Emmett, Esme, and Carlisle were unaware of my true investment in this fight, but Edward knew where my anger at him truly resided.

_How could you, Edward?_ I growled in my head. _You were so self-righteous you couldn't hunt them even though you knew what they'd do to me._

"I didn't know." He mumbled, his eyes locked in mine. "I swear it."

I still didn't look away, but I was afraid of Emmett catching anything from our exchange so I willed Edward's silence further.

_Convenient that you decided to stop hunting murderers when there were so many down the street from you in Rochester. _

He didn't answer me aloud now, but his eyes held a heavy sadness as he saw where I was going with my rage. I couldn't respond to his sadness. I only had rage.

_You let me die. That's as good as killing me yourself, and you know it._

"Rosalie, you see he's back now, and he's really committed to making this lifestyle work. He saw that ultimately, our best counteraction to the monstrosity of others of our kind is to maintain a _total_ abstinence from human blood." Carlisle tried to correct my thoughts, but he was far off as to why I was angry.

"Just like you." Esme nodded, seeming to compliment my control like I needed it.

I didn't.

My record was almost as clean as Carlisle's. I'd never tasted human blood, and I prided myself on this fact. I knew Edward thought I was self-righteous, but it wasn't his lapse that bothered me.

It was that he'd decided to be _moral_ right when I needed him not to be. He didn't bother protecting me. He didn't bother stopping it.

Edward looked over, trying to communicate mentally with me.

"Edward knows now that he wants to make this life a life worth living and this can be done by preserving the essence of who we are with _no exceptions._" Carlisle went on.

I saw he said this part for Emmett's benefit, but I couldn't even care. I was still so angry.

If Edward had heard Royce's thoughts… or John's… or any of those awful men, and hunted them before they took everything from me…

I would still be alive. More than that, those… _monsters_ would've never been able to… do what they did to my body…

"Rosalie, I had _no_ idea." Edward tried to remind me.

_Did you think I deserved it? Is that why you let it happen? Don't think I don't remember how you sneered my name at the sight of me when Carlisle brought me back. _

"No. I could never." Edward argued vehemently with my thoughts.

Carlisle and Esme seemed to catch on a little that I wasn't mad about Edward's diet choices and so they stopped interrupting…

The rest of the room wasn't let on to my side of our dialogue, but still. I was livid Edward had the audacity to answer me aloud.

I willed his silence more than I'd willed anything except to be human again or to die.

He was already on my bad side, and he'd just dug his grave deeper and deeper.

I thought about the life that I'd lost, the _dignity_ that I lost.

Edward had the power to stop it, and if I'd been anyone else from 1927 to 1931, he probably would have. I was in the wrong place at the wrong time _yet again_.

I glared at Edward, not letting up in my anger. _Nothing_, no shred of the atonement in his eyes could move me.

"I didn't hear anything leading me to _believe_ it was premeditated…" Edward said in a soft, careful tone, but it did nothing to calm me.

"Edward! If you value your life at all, you'll shut your mouth." I snarled at him in a panic. "I could _kill _you right now."

I couldn't seem to grapple with the fact that they were just… _drunk_ and unable to control themselves, and I was just an unlucky passerby. It almost _forgave_ their behavior! How could Edward even _think_ that?!

They were _monsters_, and it was in their nature to do something terrible to me. I couldn't believe that it was a group of good people that did something horribly_ bad _because they were out of their minds.

I _had _to believe they were bad all along. Because… I had to think that no one else could be capable of that sort of atrocity. I had to believe they weren't just caught up in a moment.

It wasn't that I was just _unlucky_ and caught _good_ people at a _bad_ moment… Because if that was the case then who else could be capable of doing that sort of thing in a '_bad'_ moment… Emmett?

A dark chill racked through my whole body and I shivered in a disgusting terror I couldn't shake.

I wasn't here anymore. I was in a flashback, and I was trapped.

"Rosalie, that is _not_ what I'm saying." Edward spoke again softly, and it sent me into a frenzy so I lunged for him.

I'd been tangled up in a web of darkness, and my skin crawled when I felt a phantom pain at those monsters's hands on me… Their….

"Rosalie?!" Emmett's fingers found my elbow in an effort to draw my attention and hold me back from Edward.

"_Don't _touch_ me_!" I shrieked as I ripped my arm out of his reach, reacting wildly inappropriately because I'd been fixated and transported back into my nightmarish memories.

Emmett was confused and taken aback at how I'd yelled at him. He had his hand up in a sort of surrender.

His crimson eyes were terrifying and wide as he looked at me patiently, but I still panicked.

My eyes began blacking out and I started to disassociate so I knew all I'd see now was that night in Rochester.

I was so angry. I couldn't believe Edward's _perfect_ timing on deciding to deal in moral absolutes…

Carlisle and Esme looked over at Edward for answers, but Emmett just looked at _me_.

His brow was furrowed in confusion, and his eyes darted over me in meticulous observation as if he could see clues toward my behavior. He was trying to figure something out that he never could.

"Rosalie, darling, let's go for a hunt and get some fresh air." Esme spoke up, stepping slowly and tentatively closer to me.

Esme's gaze was full of motherly concern, her voice shaking a little as she tried to remain calm.

With this, I was immediately brought back and thrown into present mortification. I wanted the floor to swallow me whole. I'd lost control.

I'd become something I was ashamed of. Emmett had seen me as a _monster_ for the very first time. In my desperate thirst and provocation, I'd gotten overdramatic.

_This_ is why I didn't push myself.

I regained composure, tugging on the wrists of my pristine white gloves, adjusting them on my hands. I cleared my burning, tight throat lightly.

"I'd like to be alone. Thank you." I breathed in a pleasantly even tone.

Emmett's eyes were still heavy on me and it was oppressive. Damn that he'd remember this moment perfectly with his vampiric retention.

He looked at me like a scolded puppy, his eyes wide and round as he took a deep swallow. He didn't understand what he'd done, but he was full of remorse and regret all the same.

He looked at me like I wished he'd never look at me. Like he saw for the very first time that I was broken.

Like an old doll missing an arm or a leg, I was broken, and now he could toss me aside…

That's when I realized I really, truly, complexly_ cared_ about him.

So I fled out to the woods. It was easier to leave than to be left.


	7. Hiding

Thank you thank you thank you for your words! I appreciate your time and responses.

This chapter is in Emmett's POV again and I loved writing a conversation between he and Edward that I imagined was necessary given the circumstances. For reference, the poem Emmett and Edward are discussing is called "The Clod and the Pebble" by William Blake. It is GORGEOUS. I loved getting to nerd out over it a little and insert it into a veeeeery topical conversation as well as some obvious foreshadowing that Rose and Em end up together.

I also deal with a little tease of Emmett and Rosalie's budding relationship in the future in contrast with his complicated attachment to his past. I can't wait to delve into the back story next chapter!

Please review!

Thank you so much for reading! Enjoy!

* * *

_**Hiding**_

_I think you hide_  
_And you don't have to tell me why_  
_You cry a little, so do I_

_I know that you're hiding_  
_I know there's a part of you that I just cannot reach_  
_You don't have to let me in_  
_Just know that I'm still here_  
_I'm ready for you whenever, whenever you need_  
_Whenever you want to begin_

_I know you've tried_  
_But something stops you every time_  
_You cry a little, so do I, so do I_  
_And it's your pride_  
_That's keeping us still so far apart_  
_But if you give a little, so will I_

_so will I_

* * *

**Emmett -** Cognitive Dissonance

I stared down at the letters in jumbling patterns. I was beginning to understand what they spelled and how the words fit together. However, they still didn't make a lick of sense to me.

My head got heavier and heavier as I stared at the page, trying to concentrate, but I got distracted seeing past the page and into the very makeup of the paper. I saw the edges of the ink, exactly how the book was printed.

This was hopeless.

"It's about contrasting viewpoints on love." Edward said aloud over his depressing piano music.

I sighed, exhaling the breath I'd been holding for the past hour and a half it felt like.

Reading this afternoon had me feeling slightly irritable and not understanding why in God's name Rosalie liked these poems.

They were complicated.

_She_ was complicated, and I was anything but.

"These words just don't make any sense. Who the hell says 'seeketh'?!" I tossed my hands up.

"Apparently William Blake does." Edward attempted humor as his hands fell silent on the piano keys.

"All right smart ass." I narrowed my eyes, only half responding to his humor.

I was impatient and trying to remain distracted. Rosalie had been gone for five days, and I assumed it had been some sort of hunting trip because her eyes were black as night and she'd acted so oddly out of character.

I tried not to think of how my own thirst had made me act just a short while ago. I was still so out of control. My mind was not my own, and I wondered if Rosalie's thirst is what made her so upset.

It made sense she was thirsty…

My own throat burned at a manageable smolder now, so I went back to fixating on Rosalie's absence.

But, what peaked my interest was what had set her off. I was observant. I wasn't book smart, but I caught on to a lot more than I let on. Especially with her.

I was enchanted with her so I drank in all of the details.

Carlisle said he would never change someone with another choice so I knew now that Rosalie had been killed. She hadn't gotten sick like Edward, and it wasn't some conscious-less animal like the bear that killed me.

I think… s_omeone_ killed her.

It sent a chill up my spine that tempted my inner monster as I imagined someone hurting her.

It burnt my thoughts in a red hot rage.

And she thinks Edward _knew _them…

Or at least would've known their thoughts…

Edward's hands fell on the keys and it jolted me out of my thoughts.

"Sorry." He mumbled.

Of course, he knew what I'd thought and it was disruptive enough to interrupt his music, but he didn't say anything to respond to my thoughts aloud.

It was dead silent before he picked up with a different song. Something impossibly more depressing.

The house was pretty quiet in general after she and Edward had their little outburst, so everyone was packing everything up in focus and solidarity. We were leaving in two short days, and no one had touched Rosalie's things so I figured she'd have to come back to pack them at some point.

I didn't have any belongings of my own, so I helped Esme and Carlisle with everything they needed, but even staying busy I was experiencing a heaviness I couldn't shoulder.

Rosalie was gone and she'd looked so… _upset_ the last time I'd seen her, so this obviously depressed me, but I also couldn't help to worry about my family.

I would _never_ see them again, and it was a hard burden to bear.

Would they be able to get on without me? Did I even have family left? Annie had been sick last time I saw her, and _Dorothy_…

God… _Dorothy_…

"What's a 'c-lod'?" I asked Edward aloud, trying to get back to this poem.

Reading something Rosalie recommended was important enough to distract me from the dark thoughts about my family.

Edward corrected my pronunciation.

"It's a piece of clay, like molding clay." Edward answered.

"And what's that got to do with _love_?" I was so close to giving up completely.

"Well… The first stanza is suggesting the clay believes love is selfless and when you love someone you devote yourself to making life better for them." Edward was obviously struggling with finding a way of explaining this to a simple mind like mine.

"It's not simple." Edward answered my thoughts which I still found amusing. "It suggests that the clay believes when you're in love even Hell can be Heaven."

I frowned.

"And… it's a piece of _clay_ talking?" I widened my eyes, unable to believe this.

"Well, it's a form of_ personification_. Or… um… well, it's the author assuming the thoughts, personality, and characteristics of the clay into a human form. It thinks about love in this way of optimism and selflessness, because it is malleable and…"

"What does malleable mean?" I asked.

"Easily molded." Edward found this to be the simplest question I'd asked. "But, the author believes the clay would possess this viewpoint because it does mold itself and change and it has potential to keep growing and _changing_…"

"I get it." I half-lied.

Edward paused, waiting to make sure I'd made the necessary connections in my slow brain.

"And… the last stanza is a mirror of the first, but it's a pebble talking about _selfish _love. And the pebble says this because it's stone.. Hardened… Finished. A pebble can be nothing else. It's in its final form. Innocence versus experience."

My brain was mush already, but I caught on enough not to feel like a total idiot.

"You're not an idiot." Edward argued with my thoughts again and this time I chuckled honestly feeling a little lighter already.

"Tell me what you think now that you understand." Edward encouraged.

I was mostly not very enthusiastic about this, but I proceeded at his eager request.

"Well… I guess the clay's kinda being childish, but the pebble's a little harsh so it's a meet in the middle kind of deal as far as good love goes." I felt a furrow in my brow as I looked down at the page.

I felt self-conscious, but I mean there was nothing I could do about it now. I already said it.

"Sure!" Edward seemed excited by my thoughts, a happy teacher pleased with his student. "But, it's a very deceptively deep poem to be so short - two conflicting ideas existing all at once - a sort of _cognitive dissonance_. On deeper reading, I concluded that I believe instead of two _separate_ types of love, William Blake might have been talking about two sides to the _same_ love so it's a bit more nuanced. Love can be selfless and _selfish_ at the very same time. There's not necessarily a good and evil, but the light and darkness of love being inextricably linked."

I wasn't going to ask what some of those words meant, because I understood the gist of what he was saying any how, and he wasn't finished.

He was getting carried away.

I was too, but in a different direction.

He and Rosalie were both _intellectual_ types.

I bet they talked about books and ideas all the time. Esme and Carlisle too.

There were a lot of barriers between Rosalie and I, but class seemed to be the biggest one I could process and understand.

But now that we were vampires, there was no class. It was us, and then the humans…

Predator and prey.

Right?

"I suppose it's about how sometimes we can think we're giving people this selfless, innocent love, but it does have a dark undertone." He tried simplifying and redirecting my thoughts back to the poem.

"The clay is being molded and shaped and changing into whatever it needs to be. It is literally being _stepped_ on in the poem, and is that passivity truly a good experience of love? That seems pretty oppressive and horrible to me. Or is the pebble, unmoving and formed, experiencing a facet of love that is full of selfishness but not inherently... intentional, because we are _pleased_ by what the person we love does for _us_, and how they make _us_ feel? So, it's an unintentional and unavoidable selfishness. I think it's interesting to think that maybe love is _never _innocent."

"Or you could say it's also saying when you love someone… you're taking it all. The bad _and_ the good." Edward went on. "You're going to exist together in this perfect balance of selflessness and selfishness."

I thought of Rosalie of course even amidst the tangle of my brain.

"Why doesn't he just_ say_ all that then?" I half-growled. "If that's what he means… Why does it have to be a riddle?"

I knew I was honestly more frustrated with my lacking abilities at reading Rosalie more than reading William Blake.

"Because it's literature." Edward laughed freely, something it sounded like he didn't do very often.

It was more than literature. It was also… _Rosalie_. She was like that too.

She wasn't outright and she drove me crazy with her secrets and withdrawal. I still felt so much like a stranger that she wouldn't let in. She was full of riddles and distance.

Rosalie was complicated and played games. With her, I was tested and tried, and mostly I failed.

I felt like I'd barely scratched the surface of her, but impossibly in spite of it all I think I _loved_ her.

When I saw her so brokenly upset, out from under the veil of pleasant, put together, perfection she always wore, I realized I never wanted to see her that way again. I would make it my existence's mission to make sure she never showed a flash of displeasure on her beautiful face if I had to.

I'm pretty sure that's when I realized I loved her.

Edward and I paused for a moment, as he undoubtedly processed my thoughts.

"Have you ever been in love?" Edward asked me evenly, a question sparked by the thoughts he'd heard.

"I don't know." I shrugged, and would've been a little embarrassed if I got embarrassed that easily.

"Have _you_?" I turned it around on him.

"No." Edward wrinkled his nose as if the thought repulsed him.

"Oh, so you just _read_ a lot about it?" I teased, trying to avoid seriousness as my thoughts trailed.

"Not the way you mean it." Edward's eyes innocently went wide at the very suggestive thought in my head. "That's not love that's…"

"_Sex_."

Edward looked like he was going to throw up at just the thought. Poor kid.

I would've laughed and shifted into lightness, but a heavy thought intruded.

"Has Rosalie been in love?" I asked, knowing I wasn't going to get an answer, but I tried anyway.

"Emmett, see you already _know_ I can't answer that." Edward looked at me with scolding eyes.

It was a yes, and it irrationally devastated me. I'll bet he was smart and could talk to her about her fancy books and play fancy songs on a fancy piano wearing fancy clothes and…

"It was a you're going to have to find that out for yourself by getting to know her." Edward pushed the thoughts out of my head.

That was definitely a complicated but definite _yes_.

"No, Emmett, I just truly don't know." Edward responded. "I read _thoughts_, not emotions…"

"All right." This satisfied me for now.

"Do you think she could ever be in love with _me_?" I asked selfishly.

"That's between you two." Edward shrugged.

I groaned.

It had _never_ been this difficult for me before. I wasn't arrogant, but I knew I'd gotten a lot of women's attention in my human life. I seemed magnetic to women for reasons unknown, but not one of those reasons were attracting Rosalie. In fact, I think I repulsed her.

I would've been entranced by the hunt before, but not when I saw just how _disgusted_ she was by my pursuit.

I was afraid she'd already made up her mind about me, and I failed her tests before I'd even given it a real shot.

"You just have to wait for her…" Edward encouraged my thoughts then shifted into a comparison I'd identify with. "Like a deer… You have to let her approach, or you'll scare her off."

The way she'd looked at me the other day when I'd reached out for her… The way she'd stiffened in my arms the day I'd killed all those people and apologized to her…

Before I could even ask the question I'd been trying not to ask since Rosalie left, Edward answered my thoughts.

"I_ really_ didn't know she was going to die, Emmett." Edward said with grave seriousness in his golden eyes. "She knows that too."

"But you used to kill murderers, and you didn't kill hers?" I said in a half-statement half-question.

I tried not to sound accusing, but it did come across that way.

"No. I didn't." He confirmed, darkly. "And that _genuinely_ devastates me. She knows that."

Curiosity and a wish to just… _know_, plagued me.

"How did she die?" I asked again.

"Emmett." Edward said impatiently at my insistence.

But now, I_ knew_.

Later in the afternoon, as I laid in the floor flat on my back, tossing up a box and catching it again and again and again against my chest, I heard a stir of air outside the top floor window.

Her window.

I heard her enter through the window, all cloak and dagger, to avoid the doors in which she would've crossed my path. She was _purposefully_ avoiding me, and I stubbornly wasn't going to let her do that.

It almost made me angry.

How dare she?

On a mission, I ascended the stairs. Anxiousness built in my stomach.

She paused, sensing my presence.

I felt her on the other side of the door as I lifted my loose fist to knock.

The same oxygen filled both of our lungs as we inhaled in perfect synchronization.

"Rosalie," I said her beautiful, perfect name in a voice I reserved specifically for her.

She didn't answer and she didn't move a muscle.

I opened my mouth, willing better words than the ones I said.

"Do you need any help?" I asked, vibrating with nervous energy.

The door knob turned and I felt butterflies the size of eagles before she opened the door to her bedroom.

I caught her beautiful eyes the color of liquid sunshine, but there was still a storm in them.

At the sight of her, I melted into a puddle.

I didn't know what I was going to say or what she was going to say, but the threat of conversation was heavy in the air.

"I've got it. Thank you." She finally breathed, looking up at me with something in her eyes I couldn't read.

Was it shame?

"I just wanted an excuse to see you anyhow." I blurted out the thought pounding in my head.

This seemed to please her, but she didn't pleasure me with a smile.

I felt like I felt looking at someone after a really bad argument, and before you've truly made up and solved anything.

But, we hadn't even argued…

My stomach still knotted guiltily though and I felt like apologizing.

"I'm sorry." I said instinctually.

"What are you sorry for?" She asked, furrowing her perfect brow in confusion, but her tone made it seem a little like one of her tests.

I swallowed nervously. Would I pass?

"Edward wouldn't tell me how you died." I started not how I would've expected.

I avoided her eyes as I said this because I was worried about her reaction.

"As he shouldn't." She snapped harshly.

God, I'd made things worse.

This caused my eyes to dart up to hers.

I saw the defiance of her vulnerability in her perfect face, but the longer we looked at each other in this loud silence, the more her eyes softened into me.

"But I figured it out." I said hauntingly.

Something I imagined was fear darted across her eyes like a terrible shooting star.

"Everyone else… it was just an accident – something they couldn't avoid like a disease or a bear or a vampire in the sewers of London… even Esme's grief made her _do_ something permanent." I observed, trying to choose my words carefully but not doing a very good job of it. "But you… Your life was taken. It was stolen. But, not by someone of chance like Carlisle. It was someone you knew and someone you trusted."

She gritted her teeth, looking down and away from me as she reached for her perfect blonde hair to twirl in her fingers nervously.

Horror is the only word I could think of to describe what radiated off of her.

"You don't have to tell me anything, but whatever you went through, it makes you afraid of me now." I said as softly as I could muster, but there was still a nervous edge to my voice that I hoped she couldn't detect.

"And for that… I'm _mighty_ sorry." I went to reach for her, but decided against it and put my hand in a loose fist by my side.

She noticed, and looked up, this being a key to her attention. She was surprised I'd retracted.

"I don't want you to be afraid of me, Rosalie." I told her, our eyes locked in one another's. "And, I swear I'm gonna prove to you that you don't have to be. I mean, I've apparently got all the time in the world."

I smiled to try and lighten the edges of the conversation, but her intensity kept us weighted.

"I'm _not_ afraid of you." She offered evenly, but she had a stubborn note to her voice as if she was convincing the both of us.

Rosalie seemed extremely annoyed imagining I had this insight on her, so I knew it must've been true.

"Then, how _do_ you feel about me?" I very boldly asked the question that had been haunting my mind since I woke up.

Rosalie again clenched her jaw like she was stifling so many unsaid words that I would've begged her to say.

She stared into my eyes in challenge, and I had the deepest urge to kiss her.

I wouldn't dare though, so I waited.

Rosalie still had one hand on the door knob and she looked at her fingers now, lowering them so I knew it was obvious something had changed in her mind.

She was opening just like her door.

Oh, how lucky Edward was getting to crawl up inside her beautiful brain.

I remained optimistic.

"Emmett?" She started, her voice newly soft and sweet as spring honeysuckle.

I was weakened so much I was afraid I was going to melt right to my knees to worship her.

I had a feeling she was going to answer my question.

"I was thinking while I was out." She swallowed, not shrinking under my gaze now.

I waited as she took a deep breath, watching for any hint of what was going to come out of her glorious mouth.

"I'll go to your family." She promised with the utmost sincerity.

My dead heart seemed to skip in my chest though I knew it wasn't possible.

I looked at her in disbelief.

"I'll make sure they're all right." She breathed, and her words caressed me like a kiss.

It was ecstasy, and I couldn't stop the smile from spreading across my face and beaming out the ends of my fingers and toes like I was glowing.

_This_ was the answer to my question.

She'd just told me she loved me.

Or at least could think of it as a distant possibility.…

I started to reach for her out of habit, but again remembered and put my hands deep in my pockets.

With that, I'd told her I loved her too.

And she knew it.

She noticed and gave me a strikingly beautiful little half smile.

I beamed back at her.

Something changed then. It was small, but it was monumental.

"I have plenty of money. It'd last them for years. Really, I don't need it." She began, blooming for me like an Easter lily.

It took my breath how she let me _see_ her, but immediately, I felt inadequate and unsure of being in debt like that.

"Really, it'll be all right." She nodded, reading my mood. "I can go to them and tell them… Well…"

Her words were a little quick now because she sounded nervous.

"I'll tell them you saved my life and it was a horrible accident. You pushed me out from in front of an automobile and you… Or you were running back into a burning building for a lost baby or something. I don't know something like that." She stumbled through her beautifully atrocious words.

My stomach felt hollow.

"They wouldn't believe that." I snorted, shame filling my entire being.

"But things like that happen all the time." She suggested lightly, seeming to think I was insulting her idea.

That couldn't have been further from the truth.

I got a little nervous, but knew it was in my nature to be boldly upfront.

"No, it's not that. It's just… I couldn't have done something like that."

I breathed, my voice rumbling in my chest nervously.

She looked perplexed, willing me forward with her insistent gaze.

"I'm _so_ glad you didn't meet me in my human life." I settled on saying, Rosalie's eyes on fire as she tilted her chin up to look at me again.

Rosalie swallowed, obviously intimidated by my words but still remaining right in front of me so it wouldn't be too obvious she had flinched and looked down at her nervously twisted fingers.

She didn't like it. I could tell.

She began to withdraw.

She was dreading my words, and I was dreading telling her.

I just knew I had to if she was even talking about meeting my family.

"Why?" She finally asked with open, golden eyes.

This took me aback and let me know something was different. Instead of running, she pushed forward a little more.

I wasn't prepared for that.

"Honestly, when I was burning before I woke up, I thought it was just my judgment for all the trouble I caused. I deserved _every_ bit of it." I recalled plainly. "Probably more."

Rosalie frowned at this, not liking hearing this.

"I don't believe that." She said confidently, but what she really meant to say was she didn't _want_ to believe it.

I tried to come up with a better way to tell her what I needed to tell her.

She stubbornly looked at me like I was… _better_ than I was. I wasn't used to that.

People never expected much from me in my human life.

And she… she expected the _world_ from me.

I just knew I couldn't deliver.

She shakily exhaled as she looked over my face. She had just been intensely vulnerable about how she felt in her own way, and she was retreating now. My time was almost up.

I had to let her know what I meant.

"You saved me in more ways than one, Rosalie." I expanded. "Becoming a vampire is the best thing that's ever happened to me."

"I'm sorry." She said heavily, and this confused me.

This seemed to force her back into her shell, her eyes falling to her feet.

"I'm serious. Rosalie, this is… this is like _heaven_ to me." I told her, fighting for her gaze and hoping she could feel my gratefulness.

"How can this be _heaven_? What you did… to that family… that little girl…" Her voice shook a little as she stubbornly denied me her eyes.

I wondered what I would've seen in them.

"I… regret that. I do." I told her, an odd pang in my stomach because I think I just lied to her and she knew it. "Okay, well, I am trying to get used to this whole vampire thing and remember why I _should_ regret it."

I clarified because I couldn't lie to her. It just felt wrong. She narrowed her eyes, but couldn't be angry at my honesty.

"But Rosalie, before _this_… before becoming a vampire, I was just a worthless nobody. Now, I…"

I trailed off, knowing if it could, my heart would be racing.

I told her honestly.

"I really do want to be _better_. I want to be the man you think I am and I really think that now I can be. When you _look at me like that_, I mean…" I told her, feeling nervous like a little boy.

My skin tingled up to the top of my skull.

"Like what?" She breathed, playing a game as she hid behind her beautiful black eyelashes now.

She was baiting me, wondering if I'd pursue. Of course I would.

And this… this was the most honest thing I'd say to her yet.

"Like you see something in me." I said, in denial of withholding anything. "Like I can _be_ something… something more."

A chill ran up my spine as I watched her look up at me with the most beautiful gaze I'd ever seen.

Her perfect, beautiful lips parted ever so slightly, and I had to fight every single instinct that told me to grab her and kiss her.

I bounced with the pent up energy, wanting so badly to feel her lips on mine.

God, to kiss her…

"No one's ever looked at me like that before." I said in a voice specifically reserved for her.

Rosalie bit her bottom lip under, looking down and away to avoid being prisoner to my enchanted gaze.

I was dizzy with her and there was no way not to make it obvious.

This moment felt so… right just to plant one on her. I could just about jump out of my skin with how badly I wanted to kiss her.

"Tell me about your sisters. What would they need?" Rosalie changed the subject with a jolt.

It was evident she'd felt awkward. She knew I was dying to kiss her.

Her insistence made me smile a little, but I had to seriously think about what they would need. I finally settled on a luxury that long had been forgotten.

"I want you to bring a chocolate bar to my sister Dorothy." I felt a pang in my chest. Of all the things she so desperately needed, just an escape from the normal awfulness that had become our lives was the top priority.

I felt better knowing Rosalie'd meet her. I felt better knowing Rosalie would be able to tell me all about how she was doing.

I prayed for a miracle

"She's my twin you know, so she's a lot like me, but she got all the good looks. I say I got the brains." I told Rosalie, fondly thinking of Dorothy.

Rosalie gave me a beautiful little smile, a giggle in her throat as she hid behind those impossibly long black eyelashes.

"But, that's probably not true neither." I teased.

"Now, Ruthie'll probably just want some penny candies or something, but she deserves to get spoiled a little." I said.

God… Ruthie…

Who'd take care of her now?

"Annie too. She's getting too grow up and tough for her own good." I felt wistfulness clawing a deep hole in my stomach.

Annie May would be all right. She was tough and smart. She'd be okay.

"And the rest of them?" Rosalie asked unknowingly.

My stomach dropped, and in this moment I didn't feel like what I was saying was real even though I'd most definitely lived it. I had the inner scars.

"They're… gone now." I nodded, finishing on a dark note. "This year hit our family pretty hard."

"I'm so sorry." She said genuinely, her eyes fiery and serious.

I sighed knowing my dark note had to keep going.

I had to tell her about my parents…

About _me_.

About what I'd done.

A frown looked so odd on her perfect angel's face as she looked down. I trailed off, deciding to switch gears.

"Rosalie, my family's _real_ important. They were _everything_ to me." I told her, willing my sincerity to be obvious in my voice so she could read it. " I could _never_ repay you for something like that - taking care of 'em when I know now… _I can't_. Not anymore. It's not safe."

The words tasted sour and spoilt. I hated them, but said them to her all the same.

"You don't have to repay me." Her voice was small and unsure, but her eyes communicated far more.

She wanted me to know she was doing this _for me_…

How'd I get so lucky?

"I do." I suggested with a final nod. "But… before you… _decide_ you're going to do something like that for me, there's something you should know… Well, a few things really."

I knew my tone suggested I was about to be painfully honest with her because I read fear and dread in her eyes.

"All right." She nodded, knowing I was about to trust her with something important.

She had no idea.

"First, I probably didn't grow up quite like the rest of y'all… We don't got much and my house isn't fancy or big or open or anything." I pushed up on my sleeve to keep my eyes busy and away from her.

I wasn't _ashamed_ of my upbringing, but I was… insecure around Rosalie.

"That doesn't matter to me." She cut me off, something intense flickering in her eyes.

"It's gonna be different than what you're used to." I looked around this opulent house that we were just leaving empty.

"Emmett, that's fine." She told me strongly, and I couldn't get used to hearing my name on her lips.

"But… more than all that Rosalie, you should know why I was so far off the trail in the woods alone that day you found me. My Pa'll bring it up if you see him." I began in a heavy mumble.

"Okay." She nodded, reacting to the darkness she saw in me with alarm.

She still had no idea. I dreaded telling her, but I was painfully honest and it was something I couldn't change.

She had to know. It would protect her.

"I figured you outta know sometime, and… if you go see my family, then… It's… why they wouldn't believe your story…"

I worried she'd change her mind. I wouldn't blame her. It was hard.

I took a deep breath.

"Well here it goes." I made a face to lighten the mood, but it was obvious to her that this was something heavy I was about to tell her.

My stomach dropped to my knees. I wasn't used to having… expectations. She expected so much from me, and she thought I was… _good_. She thought I was so much better than I was and I was about to shatter her idea of me in one fell swoop.

"After my little sister Caroline died, then a couple months later it was my sister Molly, then my sister Elizabeth, then even my friends and acquaintances started droppin' like flies, so I hit rock bottom, and I hit it _hard_." Saying it out loud wasn't easier even all this time that had passed.

I ran a hand through my hair in stress.

"I just got… _reckless_. I chased… danger and escape and had too much fun for my own good." I snorted a humorless laugh.

Rosalie didn't even flinch, but I saw her wondering.

"I caused enough trouble people began to swear it was my middle name. I… don't deal with being sad very well, and everyone around me just started… _dying_, so I just kept getting myself distracted into deeper trouble than I could get myself out of." After turning in to a vampire and removing myself, I was able to gain a little perspective on what happened.

"I was… drinking _a lot _those days and doing some… _questionable_ things…" The look in her eyes made me know I had to be specific because she was imagining the worst and that probably wasn't even close.

"I… stole some things we needed at home from the store. I… fought nearly every night at the town's fight club and would set up some pretty crooked gambling bets so I'd get the payout. I… was disrespectful to some cops in town and… I had some… pretty _irresponsible_ relationships with some of the wrong women…" I saw she seemed to be attacked and wounded by every word I'd say, but she looked directly into my eyes at the end of my list, searching…

I took a deep breath.

"I finally got busted for… well, stealing a car, and driving around drunk." I admitted.

"But the real kicker was… I had taken all my family's hunting guns so my Pa wouldn't have them if he caught me out and tried to do something… _permanent_ and…" - I know it looked like to Rosalie this was an excuse for my behavior, but it was a genuine concern at that point in time that he'd kill me if he got the chance…

Then, she processed and her eyes went wide. I had to finish. I was nervous.

"It just looked too good to a small town cop - a delinquent of society out late, angry, drunk, and _armed_."

"I… had recently got a real good reason to kill some people in town anyways… so it looked like that's what I was gonna go do… I was blacked out though so I don't know or remember… Maybe I was…"

I told her this with brutal honesty – so brutal she winced. Or maybe she winced at the murderous look in my eyes that I felt plain as day. I felt the return of anger and rage and worked really hard to squash it while I told Rosalie the rest.

"Either way, I already had enough stuff on my record that I finally got the big time."

I made a face, looking over at her to check that she hadn't been squeamish of my criminal past and checked out.

She hadn't though. Just like when I told her about that family… all that blood.. She remained strong and steadfast as she listened to me.

I saw that charming stubborn clench of her jaw as she willed me to finish.

The hard part was almost over.

"I _hated _prison." I recalled with a sour taste in my mouth. "I know that's the point - it's not supposed to be a holiday, but the laws had us all chained up in the woods just doing grunt work for no good reason other than to order us around."

"But you already know I'm not real good with rules and so every day I was there, I got smart with 'em and they'd unchain me from the rest of the guys and take me over to the side. A group of em would take turns just knockin' me senseless. I guess that made 'em feel better about their own lousy lives."

I laughed a little, but she didn't.

She grimaced. I think… she worried about me. It was cute. I couldn't help but grin

"I got wise though. I'm a pretty good fighter, so… one day I planned to be extra smart with one of 'em and I just… fought my way out and ran like hell." I said with a little proud smile. "I ran until I was face to face with that bear."

She exhaled as I chuckled.

In a warped way, that was the happy ending.

"In January, I got booked for three years which didn't seem like the end of the world, but still… I couldn't have saved you from a burning building if I was busy breaking my back working for the state penitentiary." I explained why she'd have to come up with some other story if she saw them.

All she could do was just nod.

"I hope I didn't scare you off, Rose." I went to reach for her again then denied my impulses, willing my hands back into my pockets.

She looked down at my hands in my pockets and took a deep breath.

Something changed in Rosalie then, and she looked up.

"I told you already, you don't scare me." She said with a stubborn nod.

I almost believed her.


	8. St Jude (Part I)

Guyssssss, This chapter is slightly indulgent in the sense that I got to write Dorothy as an original character. She just came to life as a really important figure in the formation of Emmett that I used as a tool to explain his development/ subsequent relationship with Rosalie, but she's got such a beautiful personality and heart that I owed her time as a stand-alone character, as well as a little bit of a tool in Rosalie too. (no spoilers). I loved getting to write Emmett's family though, and to me this interaction is just as important in the character development we'll see in Rosalie as well.

In a way, I also wanted to write Dorothy as a foil character for Rosalie to highlight character development and Rosalie's struggles with no longer being human. Emmett's mother was also a foil character for Rosalie in my mind because of class/ socioeconomic status but also sheerly because of maternal energy and whatnot.

These next two chapters were VERY hard to write though in the emotional sense. It is HEAVY, and I understand this deals with a lot of dark topics. Because of that TRIGGER WARNINGS EXIST FOR THESE CHAPTERS. The grand narrative can be read without these next two chapters if you are uncomfortable reading them. Please take care of yourselves and your mental health.

TW: Abuse, violence

* * *

_**St. Jude**_

_Another conversation with no destination_  
_Another battle never won_  
_And each side is a loser_  
_So who cares who fired the gun?_

_And I'm learning, so I'm leaving_  
_And even though I'm grieving_  
_I'm trying to find the meaning_  
_Let loss reveal it_

_St. Jude, the patron saint of the lost causes_

* * *

**Rosalie -** _Not a Home_

I looked toward the window, watching as the sky began to turn grey.

The rain would start soon, clouds covering the sky in a heavy blanket across the Southeast. It was the perfect day.

I closed my box now, satisfied with packing. I started toward the coat rack where I'd hung a white day scarf and some gloves.

I slipped off my current gloves and slipped on a nicer lace pair and wrapped a white scarf over my hair.

Emmett, Edward, and Carlisle had gone hunting before we'd be getting on the road tomorrow morning. It was a perfect time for me to leave on my own mission.

"Where are you going?" Esme asked in conversational curiosity.

I could tell she was really just itching to talk to me about my extended absence, but I denied her.

"I've got to go into town and grab some things before we leave." I lied easily.

I threaded my arm through the loop of my bulging handbag. It was thick with the stacks of money I'd stuffed in there.

Emmett didn't need to know where I'd gotten all this money.

It was Royce's money.

Every last cent was Royce's money that I'd taken when I killed him. I don't know why I took it, except sometimes I'd look at the stacks of towering bills as a reminder of my human life and its downfall.

I kept it as a relic of my own naivety and blindness. I'd been so… _blinded_ by his… money and his attractiveness as an eligible bachelor. I'd been so distracted that I couldn't see…

Maybe I took it as a way of getting back at him for his defamation of my good name and reputation. Maybe I took it as a way to wipe the world of any traces of him.

However, I knew it would have the opposite effect.

He would become a martyr as soon as they found his body... They would assume someone did it for his money.

So, I left my wedding dress in the vault that was empty besides his dead, disgusting body.

I think I wanted everyone to think they knew I did it, or at least my ghost did.

I was… theatrical.

The rest of the Cullens didn't know I'd been so careless, allowing rumors and stories to bud surrounding the deaths of those men. I imagined they'd be disappointed in me.

It had been careless. But, I had been desperate.

I shook my head to redirect.

I thought of my conversation with Emmett late yesterday afternoon…

Something stirred in my stomach like a butterfly.

Nothing could scare me off, even all that he said, and something about his frankness set me on fire.

He trusted me, treating me as his _equal_. He talked _with_ me, not at me.

No one had ever done that before…

This revelation made me want him more than I'd ever wanted him before – to expand on such intimate conversation and manifest our closeness.

On one hand…

On the other hand, I was broken hearted. My soul was ripped out. I was devastated to find out more _darkness_ under his innocent boyish face. I couldn't accept his goodness had just been an illusion. I couldn't. I couldn't cope.

But amidst it all, leaving today for his family's house, I agreed to something I didn't even know I could do. However, I could see he needed it of me, so of course I would move mountains.

And, this was the only way I could answer his question about how I felt about him. As I spent my time alone in the forest this past week, I'd come to the conclusion that _action_ was his language.

He didn't need my words, even though I didn't have any because they were all a tangle in my head.

Emmett communicated only through _doing_, and if I was going to make it up to him for snapping at him with unwarranted anger or if I was going to let him know that I did… _feel_… _something for him… _no matter how complex or confusing it was to me, I had to do this.

"Would you mind grabbing something to protect this china? Just something that I can wrap it in?" Esme requested.

It was one of her prized props - dinner plates and a silver set. I didn't blame her. Aesthetic beauty was also one of my fixations. I felt that my environment really contributed to my mood and mental state.

I really did love that Esme wanted to make a beautiful home…

"Of course." I said, putting on a pair of sunglasses before I ducked out the door.

I was in the car what seemed like forever. I could've_ run_ faster than this.

Roads turned to gravel then gravel turned to dirt then dirt turned to dust under my tires.

I was lucky that the sky rumbled with the threat of a storm, but not a drop of rain fell from the sky. It was perfectly over cast.

I watched the grass get higher, and the spaces between houses getting longer and longer.

Everywhere I looked was brown.

Mud. Dirt. Dust. Muck.

I had perfect vampire retention so when Emmett had told me where he'd lived, I'd remembered.

However, the farther I drove, the more convinced I was I'd made a mistake.

I hadn't seen a house for miles, just little shacks here and there dotted along the land, a couple of barns, and some workers that whistled as I passed, when I finally came up on a dusty road on my right that I was supposed to turn down.

The mud seemed heavier, the grass seemed taller, the white cotton seemed more like ghosts dotting the haunted land and warning me to turn around and run.

It looked exactly like I'd imagined and endless road to nowhere would've looked.

I would have given up, but that's when I saw it.

Just as Emmett said.

As I approached, I knew I was in the right place, but it still felt so _wrong_.

I'd never seen anything like this. It was all at once enchanting and terrifying.

Three girls that looked like they'd been raised by wolves sat out on the caved in front porch of a rickety house. They watched me curiously as I approached.

One of the younger feral girls which must've been Ruthie or Annie May had their eye down the barrel of a rifle bigger than they were. Emmett told me that Annie May was twelve, and Ruthie was six, but these two girls looked no older and bigger than nine and four.

The girl that must've been Annie May lowered the gun from their big brown eyes, just like Emmett's, except Annie May had a light yellowed bruise around her left eye.

She flicked on the safety before putting the gun by her side. Curiosity made her stand up by the creaky column holding up the patched roof over her head of brown hair.

I recognized Dorothy immediately because the feminine version of Emmett's features were prominent on her sun-tanned face. She had long black hair and big blue eyes so that she resembled that Hollywood starlet Vivien Leigh in the movie role of a starving, suffering girl in rural Tennessee.

Dorothy was really beautiful under all this.

Dorothy had her long, ink black hair in a messy, knotted braid that went down the center of her back and almost down to her tailbone. It had been a while since she cut her hair, or did anything with it for that matter.

Her skinny legs were tucked under her while she taught the other girl crouched like a wild animal at Dorothy's feet how to skin a squirrel.

"Pull hard." She instructed the littlest girl's hands on the pelt, before getting her own hands in there to finish the job correctly.

My mother always told me you could tell a lady by her hands. I'd never had to work a day in my life so my hands had been dainty and unspoiled even before turning into a vampire.

Dorothy's hands had blisters and callouses all over them. Her fingernails had mud and blood under them. She'd had to work harder than I could ever imagine.

I also couldn't help but notice a collection of dark burgundy bruises on her neck the shape of fingers. Her left eye had a purple ring around it and her lips were littered with black scabs.

It made my stomach churn.

As if she'd heard my thoughts just like Edward, Dorothy looked down and away from me in shame, hiding behind a tendril of black hair that escaped her braid as she stood to her feet too.

She wiped her dirty hands on the sides of her dress and her sweating forehead with the back of her wrist.

I stopped the car at the edge of the road, imagining it would be all right to park here.

Like I was a mirage, Annie May rubbed her big brown eyes to try and see clearer.

I realized I was nervous. I took a deep breath of sticky summer air and turned, giving a pleasant smile as I approached, taking extra care with my steps since my shoes were sinking into the mud and dirt up the path.

"You got the wrong place, I suspect, miss." Dorothy called with an accent just as thick as Emmett's and a voice that would've been just as loud, vivacious, and boisterous if whoever had given her those bruises on her neck hadn't damaged her vocal cords.

I remained watchful and wary for clues as to who could've done this to her, because it was obviously a pattern. Dorothy had the worst of it, but Annie May's own yellowed bruising made me inspect Ruthie's face too.

Ruthie was still crouched like some sort of wild animal near Dorothy's feet, and looked up at me with dusty, grey, blue eyes.

There was something visibly… _off_… about her, but her round freckled face was free of bruises.

She didn't seem to know how to speak, or less likely, I was speaking in a language she didn't understand. She just stared at me with those wide, dusty blue eyes.

"No, I believe I got the directions right." I offered nervously.

I sounded nervous because I was. I was certain I was in the right place though.

Dorothy was so much like him…

Dorothy crossed her skinny, bony arms over her hollowed chest. There was no way she was Emmett's age, or well, older than me at my change. She looked wiry, bony, and shapeless like an early teenager.

Muted colors of fabrics danced on the clothesline, waving like threadbare flags of surrender in the coming storm.

The air was thick with a late summer storm, and my own chest seemed to manifest its thickness.

I took in everything I could about this place, the place Emmett had grown up, focusing on even the tiniest details.

In a human second, I'd created an entire story about his childhood, and it was a splendid fairytale that meeting his family and seeing the reality of this troubled land would soon dissipate.

"I just made the acquaintance of your brother, Mr. Emmett McCarty." I suggested, unable to stop a smile as his name rolled off my tongue.

Dorothy looked over me as if there'd be a trace of him somewhere for her to hold onto. It was evident she missed him, but she remained light.

"Aint nobody ever addressed him so fancy before." She laughed, a laugh like Emmett's, childish and free.

She coughed, not a sickly cough, but a pained cough of straining her vocal cords and her hand came to her neck.

It made my throat burn when I imagined the blood under her bruises.

I clenched my jaw, willing myself to get a grip.

"You aint bringing any trouble are you?" Dorothy had a glimmer of panic in her big blue eyes at what I assumed was worry about how on earth I could've made his acquaintance when for all she knew he'd just been rotting away in jail.

"Who're you out there conversin' with, Dorothy?" A man's voice that was low, tough, and full of life experience came from inside the shack.

His tone was accusing like that of a jail warden that had caught one of his inmates doing something questionable.

I watched Dorothy flinch at his voice and straighten up to her full height, as she saw him.

Out from behind a creaking door came a man just a little shorter than Emmett but with that same raven black hair and jawline so their relation was evident.

"I don't know. Who am I conversin' with?" Dorothy had the same quick wit and straight to the point conversational skills that Emmett did, and she raised an eyebrow as she looked back at me.

"My name's R-…." I started to give my real name then I cut myself off for some reason of security. "Vivien Leigh."

I blurted the name of the Hollywood starlet Dorothy had made me think of. God, how stupid. They didn't seem quite like the moving pictures type so I assumed I was safe.

"And who's Vivien Leigh?" Emmett's father asked crossing his huge arms over his chest.

"She knows Emmett." Dorothy responded easily, still keeping her impossibly blue eyes on me.

It made me selfishly miss my own violet eyes…

"That's some car." He marveled in a side note.

His dark eyes seemed impossibly black as they scanned over me. He was terrifying, even to me, even immortal and invincible. I didn't want to believe he was responsible for the markings on his children, but it was seeming evident.

Annie May and Ruthie both avoided his eyes.

It made the venom in my veins flare.

That's when a woman appeared at the threshold of the house. She was warmly maternal and had a subtle prettiness to her. She had a few silvery streaks in her shoulder length brown hair, but had a juxtaposing youthful roundness to her.

Her hair had prematurely greyed from how hard her life had been, but otherwise, she was vibrant with impossible youth.

As she flashed a smile in my direction it was obvious this was Emmett's mother by her wide smile and dimples.

I drank in every bit of him I could see here.

I noticed the whole family was all intensely nervous and staring at me, but she was invitingly warm.

"Miss Vivien Leigh, how lovely to make your acquaintance." She began, extending her hand for mine. "Helen McCarty."

The first thing I noticed was the finger shaped pattern of green bruises on her wrist, but I made sure she didn't know I'd seen them.

I was disgusted at the violent undercurrent evident already in this place. It triggered something deep within me that froze at the sight of danger and I began to clam up.

I had to fight it and focus. My mind stayed busy analyzing Emmett's mother.

Mrs. McCarty had manners and carriage that separated her from her husband and children, and it seemed I'd been the first guest in a long while to appreciate them.

"It's a pleasure, Mrs. McCarty." I smiled and shook her hand swiftly enough she wouldn't notice my cold skin through my gloves.

I watched his family around me, drinking in the details like a fish in water because I saw him in their faces, in their hugely open eyes, and in his mother's dimples as she smiled over at me pleasantly. I realized I didn't want to miss a glimpse of him.

"Did I hear my son sent you?" She asked in a sweet, caramel voice.

Just like Dorothy, she searched me for traces of him.

I nodded with a grin.

I saw she looked upon my clothes with the slightest wistfulness as if once long ago she had dressed similarly. She didn't wear gloves on her calloused, bony hands now but I saw the delicacy in which she flourished her hands as she spoke. She knew what it was like to wear lovely lace gloves.

I picked up in her eyes that Emmett's mother worried about how I saw her.

Honestly, as I met her gaze and she sighed, I saw an old civility in her like she'd not always been a part of this world. I saw in her posture that perhaps she'd been a Southern Belle on a different tier of society when love and children pulled her further and further down the dirt road.

Her accent was also just a little different than the rest of them. It was slight, but I noticed it.

Alabama. Old Southern Money. King Cotton money.

I recalled Emmett had mentioned his family had moved. I wondered if life had always been like this for their family or if it was just the Depression.

It had been nothing but a myth to me. I was protected by class, money, and my parents, but it was a living reality to this family. Want had been replaced by need and need was now desperation for survival.

My father had me under the impression that people like this just brought it on themselves.

As I stood here though, I frowned.

I was unsure of everything I knew of socioeconomic status.

"Girls, you'd swear I didn't teach y'all any manners. We have a guest. Go get cleaned up for dinner." Emmett's mother encouraged, looking over at Dorothy just for a fleeting moment before she painfully looked away.

Dorothy knew what was expected of her.

"Come here, little bird." Dorothy bent down to pick up Ruthie and winced in evident pain at unseen afflictions on her skeletal body.

She put Ruthie on her hip like a baby though Ruthie was far from it now - in physicality anyway. Ruthie's legs were long enough to hang halfway down Dorothy's gangly body. Ruthie ducked her head to Dorothy's shoulder and Dorothy kissed her head.

Dorothy brushed by her mother like a phantom without another glance, and it became evident they had a relationship based on distance and it was better that way.

"Now, come on inside out of this heat." Emmett's mother motioned me inside. "I'm almost finished with supper."

Emmett's father's eyes were heavy on me, but he didn't follow us. Instead, he turned to scold Annie May for something she'd done incorrectly with the gun. Before they left my sight line, I saw him grab her arm in a way that made me flinch too.

I had to focus on the task at hand.

I would be alone with Emmett's mother. In a different, normal life this would've been difficult because I was trying to impress her or win her favor…

Now, it was difficult because I would be ignoring the burn of my throat at the thought of her hot, beautiful blood.

I clenched my jaw. I was better than this. I was angry with myself.

"Emmett told me so many lovely things about you." I said with my very best finesse as I followed her inside.

I could focus on being the charming, sociable Rosalie Hale that I had been so long ago…

I remembered parties, and kisses on the cheeks, and champagne, and money, and… _Royce_… and inappropriate advances from my father's friends… and… crushing expectations… and… stifling... and...

"Oh, he's too kind to me." She responded with perfect civility before she opened the creaking door for me.

I saw decorum in her like I saw in Esme, and even though the McCartys had nothing and this house was a little more than a shack, you could tell aesthetics mattered a great deal to her and she spent time decorating it with what she could.

I took in the room, trying to find any trace of Emmett living here - an old photograph, a lost pair of shoes, anything that might have been an artifact of his human life. I wanted to imagine him sitting in the chair in which I would sit, what things he laughed at, what days he passed under the sun in tanned human skin.

Something caught my eye, and it was the piano in the corner. I imagined Emmett learning those few, awkwardly played notes of Ave Maria at that very piano and it made my breath hitch in my chest.

"He told me you played." I mentioned, keeping my eyes on the ivory keys trying to imagine his human fingers there.

I couldn't really imagine him here at all. It felt so displaced.

He felt too... big for this stifling, strangling place.

"Oh, not very well." She said and it was evident she said this modestly, because I watched her eyes light up. "But, I studied a lot as a girl. The piano was the only thing I brought with me when we moved."

"I understand. Music does the soul well." I responded, knowing it was necessary to keep conversation easily flowing. "Where were you from?"

"I grew up in Alabama on an old plantation." She said, not to my surprise.

She confirmed my musings.

"And yes, I agree. Music… Ah, it really keeps me happy, especially these days." She smiled tightly and motioned for me to sit at the kitchen table next to her while she cut some tiny, meager looking vegetables. "When it's gotten pretty hard..."

If she made one misstep with that knife and cut herself and _blood_…

I tried not to look too nervous.

"Do you play?" She asked with a smile.

I just bit my lip and nodded modestly.

"I'm sure you're a beautiful musician." She added.

I noticed again how differently she spoke than the rest of the family.

"I've just had a lot of practice." I exhaled thinking of all the extra hours I'd accumulated over the past two years.

"I haven't had much time for music since we moved here a little over a decade ago, but I insist on keeping the piano close. It seems like… well, sometimes it seems like my only connection to staying civilized way out here." She giggled without humor. "John always said it was silly to keep it around though."

I understood her hang up. I also sensed just how much my presence had triggered immense self-consciousness in her. I'm sure it had been easy to forget that not everyone lived like she did when she was so immersed in this world, but now I was standing in front of her as a reminder that there was still another world out there - one she was locked out of now.

"I just like to have it here…" She looked over to the ivories with melancholy.

I noticed immediately a photograph on the ledge of the piano and an uncharacteristic smile spread across my face.

"Is this Emmett?" I grinned, picking up the old frame.

This was my first tangible trace of him living here and having another life once, and I was enthralled.

It was a lovely idyllic scene from before the 1920s. Emmett's mother was standing young, gorgeous, and well dressed with a baby in her arms and another one evident in her swollen belly. Emmett's father was crouched in the grass on his knee, uncharacteristically smiling widely with his arm around a little girl that must've been Dorothy, because right next to her was a little boy the exact same age, no more than two or three with wild curly hair and a mischievous dimpled smile.

_Henry_.

I was right and it took my breath.

I smiled, almost laughed, unable to let go of imagining the vibrance of his full, real life.

"That was while we were still in Alabama. He and Dorothy had just turned two and John had just enlisted, so I insisted we have our photograph taken… You have no idea what can happen in wartime." She sighed, still keeping her hands busy.

"How long have you had all this land?" I asked, hoping to answer my own questions about the lives Emmett had known.

I saw they were all well dressed, Emmett's mother wearing lace gloves and an elaborate summer hat.

"Oh, well… I guess it's been a little over a decade now." She nodded, seeming to sigh as she felt stifled by this knowledge. "John… was a little _unsettled_ after the war, and finally after a few years being home, he bought all this land with hopes of having something of our own apart from my parents, and so we picked up and moved. I loved him and I already had four kids with another on the way so I would've followed him anywhere."

She laughed, forcing humor and light in her eyes.

"I remember on my wedding day, people telling John and I they hoped we had a house full of children." Something dark entered her tone but she still laughed. "And children are a blessing… but God just kept _blessing_ me. I birthed _thirteen_ children. Then, He took 'em all away one by one. I thought I was cursed for the longest time. I had six beautiful, precious girls that grew up lovely and strong, and _seven_ boys and not a one of em but Emmett survived past age three. I thought I was cursed, but he had the funniest perspective when he was younger. He swore Dorothy saved him because he was the only boy that was a twin."

"I didn't know that." I pondered thinking of the fondness Emmett had for Dorothy and his easy, grateful belief in the women that 'saved' him.

"Either way, there was no place in town big enough for all of us, so we found this place out here on the land. I suppose it also made transit a little easier to work the land instead of coming in from town."

"Well, Emmett was insistent about how you made a lovely home and upbringing for him." I added for her own benefit. "He played _Ave Maria_ for me and told me it was your favorite."

She seemed heavy laden, and I imagined this would help her feel better, but she stopped cutting vegetables and I saw this truly affected her so I was glad I said it.

"Truly?" She furrowed her brow ever so slightly as she looked up at me but tried to remain removed.

"Well, that makes me glad to hear." She cleared her throat not wanting to get emotional, going back to her job of vegetables.

"I always… _worried_ about him growing up here." She snorted. "Though he never did need my worrying anyhow. I didn't even really have to raise him. He was like a weed, I didn't do _anything_, but he grew all the same, _wild_ too."

She laughed a little, this time with real bright eyes.

I couldn't help but grin back.

"How'd you know him again?" She thought to ask.

"My father introduced us." I answered quickly.

Her eyes looked over me with curiosity, but she was cut off.

Dorothy came into the room with Ruthie on her hip and Annie May trailing behind.

Immediately, my mind went into a frenzy because on Annie May's lip... was _blood_.

I held my breath and clenched my jaw, control never being this difficult before.

My mind struggled and I looked down to make sure I wasn't going to break the photograph in half as I set it back down on the piano.

"Mama, you got a wash rag?" Annie May asked.

Emmett's mother immediately sighed as if she knew her husband had hit her child, but didn't possess any shock anymore. It disheartened me when I tried to focus on anything but Annie's bleeding lip.

God. Damn. Blood.

I was reminded I was a monster.

I could've screamed.

Annie May cleaned up her lip, and I noticed outside of the frenzy of my cursed blood lust that even she wasn't surprised she'd been hit. This seemed like too common of an occurrence and I wondered if this was how it was for families and I just had no idea.

Maybe, I'd just been living in a fairytale world imagining that women weren't abused each and every day...

This harrowing, dark thought sobered me enough until Annie's bleeding got under control and I finally looked back up.

They were obviously uncomfortable I'd been here to witness Annie getting hit, so my odd behavior and aversion to the blood hadn't been too troublesome to them.

I imagined Carlisle would be proud of me. I wouldn't think even Edward or Esme could've handled what I just did.

When I finally looked back up, I noticed all three of the McCarty girls didn't look much cleaner other than their hands. Their dusty, muted color dresses still had stains and mud caked into their thin threads.

I was glad Dorothy returned because I was strangely addicted to looking at her. Dorothy had the feminine traces of Emmett's features and it made me stare at the contours of her beautiful, ruined face. Her full, baby lips were divinely feminine, but I imagined if she smiled, she'd look like Emmett and I didn't want to miss it.

However, I was also terrified when I looked at her. When I looked at her features, I saw Emmett, but when I looked into her _eyes_, it was the strangest sensation that I was looking at _myself_.

Something about her, perhaps it was the ruining of her beauty with bumps and bruises, made me feel like I was looking into a mirror.

It sent chills down my spine.

"Tell me what you need help with, Mama." Dorothy mumbled in obligation as she sat Ruthie down in one of the chairs around the table.

I worried the chair I sat in would break beneath my weight, but still I sat almost levitating around a table with extensions of Emmett.

Annie May sat next to me, wordlessly but still staring widely with those big brown eyes. I noticed her cheek was red too. I tried not to imagine the cut on her busted lip.

"Annie." Dorothy scolded, her eyes widening as she said with her gaze that it was impolite to stare.

"Did you clean that cut on your eye?" I saw Emmett's mother's eyes linger on Dorothy's face for just a second.

"Yes." Dorothy exhaled exasperatedly, jumping in to help, but not willing to talk any more.

"I'll help if you need it." I stood, the chair scraping across the floor that was mostly dirt I think, if not all dirt.

"Oh no, you're our guest." Mrs. McCarty smiled at me.

I bit my bottom lip, descending back down to where I sat.

"Will you braid my hair?" Annie asked me boldly.

"Annie. No." Dorothy scolded her in a way that was distinctly mothering, darting her eyes over.

"I'm not very good at braiding." I mumbled, trying to get out of it.

"Then, you can practice on me. I don't mind how it looks." Annie shrugged. "Just make it like Dorothy's."

"Annie May." Dorothy used more of her name, widening her eyes.

"I can do that." My voice shook with inevitability, before I smiled politely at Annie.

Then, with her own grin she turned her head so I could get my fingers in her hair.

I was nervous. What if I pulled too hard and pulled her head clean off her spine. I was anxious, but she waited for me.

I held my breath, not allowing myself to get distracted with blood lust or dangerous thoughts as I finally found the dusty locks of her hair.

My fingers moved ultra slowly and with expert care.

I used every bit of focus I had, but my mind drifted to imagining this room if Emmett had been here…

How full of life would it have been? How many laughs would have ensued?

I liked to jump into these fanciful fairytales, thinking of how he fit in to his human life.

The door opened behind me and Emmett's father sat down at the head of the table with a bottle of dark liquid. I looked down and away to avoid having my gaze caught in his direction.

Energy seemed sucked out of the room. All that was left was fear.

Emmett's mother fussed over making sure the table was set and we were comfortable. Even living like she did, she had her hair pinned back away from her face neatly which is more than you could say for her children though Ruthie giggled with happiness after I finished with Annie May's braid.

Annie May stood up and twirled side to side in vanity and confidence. It was fulfilling to see the smile on her face.

"Don't I look pretty?" She played with Ruthie, grinning.

Ruthie just smiled wide and happy.

Dimples appeared on her cheeks.

It was worth the pain.

Dorothy and Mrs. McCarty served us on mismatched fine china as if some of the pieces had been broken over time from each set, but fine china it was.

I also noticed the utensils were heirloom silver when I looked down at my place setting.

My dead heart was heavy in my chest as I traced my finger along the stem of the fork. I tried to recall the pattern on my great grandmother's silver that one day would've been mine.

It seemed silly to be sad about not having things like that now because I had no use for them. I'd have no daughter to pass my heirlooms along to. I wondered who would get my family's silver now... Would it be sold for pieces at an estate sale with the Hale name long forgotten? Would it be tossed aside collecting dust? Would it get lost? I couldn't bear to think of it.

"I know it's not much, Miss Leigh. We've fallen on hard times with the animals died off and the crops this year just not..." She began, darting her eyes down toward a meager plate of food as she sat it in front of me.

A couple slices of potatoes, a few tiny green vegetables, a carrot, and some flour mixed into some sort of gritty substance as well as some sort of meat that I assumed had to be a poor squirrel like the one I saw earlier…

Emmett's father snorted.

I realized then this was a feast for them, and she was trying to impress me. She seemed to have a thirst for entertaining that hadn't been quenched in quite some time.

Dorothy stared down at her plate, not eating though I heard her stomach make an awful growling noise.

Ruthie reached for her food with grubby hands. Her mother slapped her wrist.

"Not before Grace, darling. And remember, I told you to use your fork. Haven't I taught you any manners?" She scolded then shot me a look as if this had outed her as a terrible mother. "We have a guest."

Then, at Emmett's mother's request for prayer, Dorothy slowly reached out for my hand, her skinny fingers caked with old blood and dotted with callouses and busted blisters.

Dorothy's father claimed her hand with startling immediacy and she flinched, her shoulders so tense they rose to her ears.

Annie May took my hand, and I found her conspicuously rubbing her hand over mine to feel the soft fabric of my glove. I didn't despise her, just her insistent and obvious contact with me.

She was a sickly looking girl, coughing from deep in her lungs and wiping her nose on her sleeve before she gave her infected hand back to me. If I could contract illness, I would've definitely caught something from Annie May McCarty.

Dorothy's fingers finally reached mine, but not without great effort.

She noticed through my gloves that my hands were cold and her eyes darted up to meet mine. I took a swift inhale, my cursed throat burning at her scent, my eyes focused on the burgundy bruises around her neck where blood had risen.

Dorothy looked away now, bowing her head.

My throat was still taut and smoldering as Emmett's mother said Grace. I was watching Dorothy out of the corner of my eye so I saw she was watching me too. I tried to remember not to sit up so straight.

Humans didn't do that.

"So tell me again how you know my boy." Emmett's father jumped right in to conversation.

I was distracted from the blood in Dorothy's bruises immediately.

The way he spoke in possession of Emmett rubbed me the wrong way. There was something... menacing about it - more like a stifling ownership and less like he was claiming him proudly and familiarly.

"Well it's quite a story." I fought my thoughts of blood lust and distraction and exhaled a smile.

I was Rosalie Hale - what that meant _before_ Royce King. I could charm anyone. I was enchanting.

My mind was racing as I tried to remember all the details for the story I'd crafted on the way over.

I'd come up with so many stories and pathways I couldn't recall which one I'd decided to use.

"My daddy owns a lumber business up near the Kentucky line you see, and was looking into hiring from the penitentiary. It's terribly overcrowded anyhow so they didn't mind one bit."

"He forgot his lunch one day and I went down to the mill to make sure he got it." I told a spin on a familiar ghost story.

"I got one look at Emmett and knew he didn't belong there with all those other men. He was good, and kind, and..."

Emmett's father laughed humorlessly.

"You're sure you're talking about my Emmett?" He raised an eyebrow.

Dorothy pushed her potatoes around her plate so she could keep her gaze down, but I saw her pain without seeing her eyes.

Even though it wasn't even my fight, I longed to prove Emmett to his father.

In a way, I guess I subconsciously thought this would help me prove myself to Emmett too.

"Oh absolutely sir, I think I know my own husband." I blurted out this new fact and the air was sucked from the room as everyone stared at me.

If I could blush I would have.

God, Rosalie. Stick to the script.

I'd just gotten pig headed and testy, challenging Emmett's father, so I said something I couldn't take back. I had to think on my feet now.

"What. Did. You. Say?" Emmett's mother's big eyes were wild with questions as she looked at me like I had just grown another three heads.

Dorothy had all but fallen out of her chair and she dropped her fork to the ground with a clang. She looked at me like I was an angel and Satan all at once, then I think I saw her smile a little while she sized me up.

Annie May giggled and looked at Dorothy.

"Pardon my manners and outbursting of sorts. I see this is new information to you all." I tried to redirect. "It just happened very quickly… I was just... so taken with him when I saw him at the mill that day. Bail was no problem for my family, but my brother's a very good lawyer so he had him proven innocent anyhow, and once he was freed we were married right away."

I put on my best performance, sighing dreamily. I was theatrical and knew I could convincingly play the part of being in love with Emmett.

This made my stomach turn somersaults. I could imagine what it might be like to be in love with him. Right?

"Really?" Emmett's mother's eyes had started to mist over and I think it was tears of shock and joy.

I nodded, putting on my best 'lovestruck' face.

"My baby..." Emmett's mother covered her face with her hands to cry. I still think they were tears of joy.

It was oddly amusing and intriguing to view Emmett as someone's child, as her son. It made me imagine him again at this table, on this land, in this sticky air...

"Now don't get all emotional, Helen" Emmett's father scolded.

"He's... _Married_. And God, she's so beautiful." Helen marveled with a glisten in her eye.

"I'm sorry. You're just so... lovely, and... easily the most beautiful girl I've ever seen. My stars."

I smiled brilliantly, reveling in the approval I was getting from her.

"But oh, I could kill him for not telling me!" She frowned though. "And why didn't he?..."

"I'll bet you had your poor daddy in an early grave over Emmett." Emmett's father started, putting his elbows on the table. "He couldn't have approved of a boy like that for you. Isn't that right Dorothy?"

Dorothy's face went white as death and remained in defiant silence.

"I'm talking to you, Dorothy." He scolded, grabbing her arm gruffly.

My eyes went wide.

She silently yelped at his grip but just nodded, her big blue eyes glassy and defiant as she looked up at him. What I saw under all that was just a scared little girl.

It made my stomach churn.

"My father was overjoyed." I spoke through my teeth, but tried to maintain a pleasant outwardly appearance.

"Really?!" Emmett's father was skeptical. "I mean... Emmett's beneath you, a simple illiterate, and a criminal at that."

"John..." Emmett's mother whispered under her breath, her eyes tortured as she tried to hide her displeasure.

She didn't speak against him so this was the best she could do.

"My daddy wouldn't dare deny me." I cooed.

I got back on my game, though I frowned at the thought of what my _real _parents would've really thought of Emmett...

My mother would've been mortified and insist I was the reason she needed medication for her nerves. I imagined Emmett laughing wildly and inappropriately at afternoon tea at the country club in his too short trousers and messily tied tie.

I imagined my mother making snide remarks down her nose and my father sweating trying to make conversation over scotch that cost more than Emmett's family's land, but failing miserably at talking about anything other than banks, business, boats, or buildings.

I imagined when Emmett said something at the dinner table in his thick Southern accent, everyone would think he was stupid so they would thoroughly quiz him on impossible topics to prove it.

I imagined Emmett and I with a baby carriage walking down the street and greeting passerby that whispered behind our backs, saying our baby was some sort of white trash and no amount of my parents' money could hide that. I imagined us trying to make a life in Rochester society, but always getting sneered at and looked down on. I imagined every room we walked in we'd clear out. I imagined every table we sat down at would immediately go silent.

Then, I imagined Vera and her husband... and Henry...

Real, true, honest love.

A carpenter...

I was lost in thought and I so desperately needed to return.

"Plus, money and all that's not something I had to marry for. I have plenty. My daddy worked hard so I could marry for love. We've got old Union mill money to fall back on."

I added the last bit for my own effect and noticed the ghost of the arrogant Confederacy in his narrow eyes, so I knew I'd chosen my words correctly.

The corner of Dorothy's mouth turned up just barely before she took a bite of potatoes.

I imagined no one had ever stood up to her father.

A part of me thought maybe I could kill him before I left. I watched the vein at his throat expose as he looked over at Dorothy. I imagined hot, wet liquid then I stopped, getting a grip.

I prided myself on my control.

And, I'd never take the satisfaction of killing for vengeance from Emmett. I knew it all too well, and if Emmett wanted his father dead, he could come do it himself.

I'd bring him here. I'd let him bathe in his blood. I'd be there to make sure he didn't do it too quickly and painlessly. I would want him to be able to revel in it like I'd reveled in my own kills. I think I'd even enjoy watching him do it. And when Carlisle asked where my humanity was... I wouldn't even care. As I imagined it, I couldn't help but smile.

"Well, that settles it." Emmett's father sighed and sat forward on his elbows challenging me with his gaze but maintaining an outward appearance of hospitality and pleasantness.

Then, it was all shattered.

"It's obvious he knocked you up. You only married him to save face for your rich little society life, and now you're here to see if you can get something from us." He narrowed his eyes at me. "See if you can get this land for your Yankee daddy and his business, and my boy doesn't even have the decency to show his face to tell us that."

"John!" Emmett's mother hissed but he dismissed her, just staring straight at me.

I wasn't the woman to be challenged.

He had no idea.

In my human life, I would've just been mortified and tittered. But now… Now, I had experiences that allowed me to access sheer, monstrous _rage_.

I hated to be misunderstood and misconstrued. I hated my good name had been tainted and my reputation had been shattered. I wasn't going to let that happen again no matter how insignificant it might be.

My stomach dropped to my knees, and I felt my insides rearrange before I got them back into the right spots to speak again.

"No." I corrected, venom pulsing through my veins as I got angry, and when I got angry I got icy and I lashed out.

Out of habit, that's exactly what I did.

"Though, I do desperately wish Emmett had left me a child to remember him by now that he's _dead_." I stared straight at Emmett's father as I said words that stung on my tongue more than I had anticipated.

My womb was tragically empty and it always would be. I didn't even have to pretend I was emotional about this. I really was.

And Emmett... was dead. He'd never experience a beautiful, rich life full of experience because I'd pretty much robbed him of it. He would never father children. He would never grow old and tell stories of days gone by. He would never put down roots and walk in the sun.

He was dead.

Then, after I realized what I'd said, I ducked my head, theatrically creating the appearance of tears as I pulled out a handkerchief, covering my face.

Darkness filled the room.

"No. No. No." Dorothy pushed away from the table. "Not Em."

Emmett's mother stood with her.

My dead heart ached as I watched them process my words and enter into their grief.

"I'm so sorry." I said, and this time I didn't have to act.

I really was sorry as I watched them all fold in on each other.

Dorothy paced, her voice cracking as she started to cry in her hoarse, broken throat.

"Emmett's gone?" Annie's bottom lip trembled and Ruthie looked to Dorothy, registering her tragedy before she started to cry too.

Emmett's father clenched his jaw.

"How?..." The faintest concern flashed through his eyes. The continuous news of death was wearing him down. "How'd it happen?"

I mimed the drying of my eyes before I spoke.

Dorothy was still pacing, taking shallow, shaky breaths.

"Well he... it was a tragic accident." I began, adding a sob to my voice for effect, but watching the undoing of his family made me emotional enough that it was genuine.

"Someone lost control of their car and, he ran into the street and pushed a little girl out of the way but it was... too late for him." I settled on my first instinct though I'd practiced far more elaborate stories.

However, I saw how much they needed to believe he'd died a hero.

Emmett's mother remained strong but her eyes fogged over as she held onto Ruthie and Annie May burying their faces into her for support of their sobs.

She patted their backs in solidarity. Emmett's father shook his head, thinking of something to say, but just taking a swig of dark liquid from the bottle in front of him instead.

"We had the funeral service before I could track you down." I added depth to the tale I wove, still dabbing at my eyes and adding crying sounds.

"It was beautiful. You would have loved it... Now, he's at peace. On a hill, under a magnolia tree."

Emmett's mother seemed satisfied at this information.

"Prayers were said?" She asked to make sure.

"Absolutely. All my family are devout Catholics." I told her, knowing this was probably important to her.

Emmett had mentioned his mother was Catholic and had at least given it an honest effort to make sure her children knew what that meant.

I knew enough about Catholicism if she quizzed me.

"All right." She just nodded, taking a long swallow.

She was an incredibly strong woman, acting as the bonding agent for her family. I saw how much they all relied on her. Wisdom and maternal energy radiated from her.

She was a _lady_.

But now, she cried over her loss, feeling it deeply. I thought of what she had said about God blessing her with children only to take them all away one by one.

This loss she felt in an entirely different way. She was losing her son yes, but more than that she was losing her life line.

She wiped her eyes at the threat of tears, but still they streamed down her skin in rivers.

Emmett's mother's skin was different than Emmett's had been when I'd found him. Luckily, my vampiric memory was able to capture the exact color in the human flush of his cheeks that day.

However, Helen McCarty's skin was absent of his sun-color. Hers was sickly pale, almost squalid yellow. She looked stunted in growth, like someone that had grown up underground. The sun and light was absent on her skin.

All there was in her life was darkness…

I swallowed nervously before I spoke again.

"I came because I wanted to know you, but also… because my family… Well, _I_ have money, and I… It's the least I can do." I said as I opened my purse.

Emmett's family's eyes all went wide as full moons as I placed the large stacks of bills on the table.

I stared at them, those awful things, thinking of Royce's greedy hands on them…

on me…

I squirmed.

"We can't accept this." Emmett's mother breathed in awe, wiping her eyes as she looked at the thousands in front of her. "It's too much."

"You must." I insisted, hearing thunder rumble outside. "You're my family now too, and please… let me do this for Emmett."

"I promised him I'd take care of you, and it means a great deal that I keep my word to him."

I was able to muster up authenticity in my tone because this was the truest thing I'd said all day.

My dead heart seemed to skip in my chest as I said this. For the very first time in my life, I knew I was acting selflessly.

Or was I?…

My motives weren't e_ntirely_ pure. Yes, I wanted to help Emmett's family, but maybe more than that… I wanted to prove myself to him in one of the only way I knew how.

I looked at the money in front of me and clenched my jaw. I wanted to get rid of this part of me figuratively and literally, and now was the perfect time.

These people needed this money and for the first time… I felt ready to let go.

My mind went to the hours before my death, seeing Vera's husband kiss her with so much love, real, honest, _love_.

I realized in that moment that Royce and I hadn't had that. He didn't _love_ me. He never did. He was greedy and wanting for me, like I was an unfeeling _object_ just like these desirable stacks of bills, but he didn't _love_ me.

Maybe Royce did _adore_ me in the beginning…

But, he never loved me.

It wasn't love…

How would I have known? Now did I even know what love was?

I thought about the way Vera's husband kissed her, showcasing his love in a kiss.

I thought for a brief moment the last conversation Emmett and I had.

I could see how much he wanted to kiss me. I could feel it thick in the air around us. I could see it in the way his eyes fixated on my mouth.

But when he _didn't_ kiss me… Even when I saw how badly he wanted to…

Maybe…

Just maybe…

This time, it was something different.

When he didn't kiss me... Even when he wanted to...

Was that... real... honest... _love_?

How would I know? How _could_ I?

My stomach knotted because now...

I think I wanted…

I wanted to be _loved_.

And maybe…

Just maybe…

He could find me worthy of his love…


	9. St Jude (Part II)

So here's where I really highlighted the three facets of womanhood and feminine experience as the three characters of Rosalie, Emmett's mother, and his sister Dorothy. I wanted to talk about the call to domestic life, motherhood, identity, love, and sexual purity as a standard for measuring the value of a woman in regards to her male counterparts. These are obviously heavy topics and I took my time in dealing with them. I explain a lot of Dorothy's background to contextualize her character, but also highlight Rosalie's own character. Without spoiling anything, I think Dorothy's experience of romantic love and pursuit of it beyond social context and reason is a point for Rosalie's character development, and I think the way Emmett's mother clings to her husband is an example of this 'loveless' marriage institution Rosalie was afraid of the night she came across Royce and his friends before her assault. I also dealt with motherhood as a curse in a conversation between Dorothy and Rosalie that I found interesting in Rosalie's character development and FOIL study.

I'd love your thoughts, and reviews and I appreciate your time sending them to me!

These past two chapters were VERY hard to write though in the emotional sense. It is HEAVY, and I understand this deals with a lot of dark topics. Because of that TRIGGER WARNINGS EXIST FOR THESE CHAPTERS. The grand narrative can be read without these next two chapters if you are uncomfortable reading them. Please take care of yourselves and your mental health.

TW/ CW: Abuse, violence, rape, racial strife, pregnancy loss

* * *

_**St. Jude**_

_And I was on the island and you were there too_  
_But somehow through the storm I couldn't get to you_  
_St. Jude, somehow she knew_  
_And she came to give her blessing while causing devastation_  
_And I couldn't keep my mouth shut, I just had to mention_  
_Grabbing your attention_

_St. Jude, the patron saint of the lost causes_  
_St. Jude, we were lost before she started_  
_St. Jude, we lay in bed as she whipped around us_  
_St. Jude, maybe I've always been more comfortable in chaos_

* * *

**Rosalie -** _Domestic Servitude_

As his family cried together and recalled memories of Emmett to me, Dorothy's emotions got the best of her, and even though thunder rumbled and roared outside, she stormed out the door and into the stirring air.

"Dorothy." Her father called after her.

She didn't turn around, but he didn't follow her.

As if Emmett had told me to do it himself, I knew I had to go after her.

"If you'll excuse me for a second." I breathed, delicately pushing away from the table to follow her like a moth to a flame.

"Let her go." Emmett's mother sighed.

It was obvious she and Dorothy had a very strained relationship and she didn't know how to parent her anymore. Dorothy was her own self much as she had described Emmett to be too - raising themselves and each other alone in the world.

Emmett's mother was seeming to save me from my own misery at how Dorothy would respond to my advances.

I still had to try.

For Emmett.

"Oh, it's no trouble." I said, and it was sort of true so I followed Dorothy with conviction out the front door.

In the coming rain, Dorothy screamed into the void, kicking an old can as she crossed the yard on a warpath. She gripped her hands in her lice filled black hair, screaming again in her hoarse, strained voice before she fell to her knees in the mud.

My entire core hurt as I watched her this upset, knowing that Emmett would've been absolutely tortured by Dorothy's pain. This was the most important person in his life and he would hate to see her like this.

"Dorothy," I spoke in a soft, unsteady voice as I approached.

She cried into her hands, wailing like I'd _never _heard someone wail.

She was being ripped apart.

Something was tragically beautiful about seeing the hole Emmett left behind in his siblings and family. I didn't have that experience. I'd all but been wiped from memory or at least that's what my bigoted parents had hoped after Royce's lies.

Watching Dorothy cry now though made me think maybe one day Dorothy'd remember to tell her children about him or she'd name one of her sons after him and he'd live on in a name or a memory or an old photograph. There'd be something human and lasting about his legacy separate from his immortal one.

But, in the pain Dorothy was in now, I almost wished I could tell her the truth.

I almost wished I could tell her Emmett was all right. Well, in a way.

I almost wished I could bring her back, and make Carlisle change her too. She had the look of a lost cause and he'd always had a sore spot for those cases.

I would bring her to Emmett like a gift.

But, that wasn't fair.

It wasn't right.

I mustered up the courage to reach out for her, but just as my fingers touched her upper arm she yanked herself away.

"_Don't _touch_ me_!" She shrieked, shying away from my contact.

Something about the look in her eyes was familiar and tragically sad. I thought about the way I'd yelled the exact words in the exact same way at Emmett just a short while ago and it took my breath clean out of my chest.

The look in her eyes… I'd seen it in the mirror.

The bruises on her neck, the scabs on her lips, the black blood of her battered face, the dead emptiness in her tragically beautiful face…

I gasped an inhale before she looked over at me.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to…" Dorothy mumbled tragically.

It had hit me like a freight train.

I hadn't been ready for this. I hadn't expected this.

Something triggered deep inside of me and I wanted to run away. But I didn't. I couldn't.

Not now.

I didn't know what to say. I just froze like I had that night in Rochester under the weight of those animals.

I couldn't even fight. I couldn't even scream.

"I'm sorry." I breathed heavily.

"No. It's all my fault." She sobbed, returning her face to her hands as she sobbed, ignoring my weighted apology.

"No, it's not." I spoke as softly as I could, feeling like a ghost outside of my body as I looked on her familiar pain and brokenness.

"He wouldn't have even _been_ in that godforsaken prison if it weren't for me." Dorothy wiped her eyes, croaking through her ruptured vocal cords. "It's all my fault. He'd… He'd still be _here_. With _me_."

"Don't say that." I tried desperately to search for the right words to say but there were none.

Dorothy looked back at the house, then back at me.

"You know what he did?" She spoke in a secretive manner.

"I know a little." I didn't dare breathe, but I imagined there was more to his story than what he told me.

I was hurt, but I didn't have time to wallow.

"Would you tell me the truth then? Is that _really_ how he died?" Her gaze was harsh and challenging as if she could see straight through me, but there was something that was plaguing her thoughts that she needed me to assuage.

I nodded, hating to lie, but knowing it was necessary.

"Yes." I whispered, willing her to believe the false sincerity I was producing in my eyes and my tone.

I wondered about her cryptic words, as if there would've been some other reason he would've died lately that she could think of. I thought of what he said about having a 'good reason' to kill some people the day he got arrested.

The words now held a deeper meaning.

I was watchful, but mostly I was just still sad and taken aback, unable to think about much else than Dorothy's familiar tragic look…

"Was there pain?" Dorothy asked in a haunted breath, wanting to know. "He didn't deserve any pain..."

"No." I lied, still hating myself for lying but knowing it was the best thing. "He didn't die in pain."

She exhaled in a small relief, but she boiled over again.

"_None_ of this would've happened if it weren't for me." Dorothy gritted her teeth seeming to be angry all anew.

"Emmett'd still be alive... And... and... and... God, everyone around me is _dying_..." She started to panic, and I tried not to get distracted by the quickening of her heartbeat and the venom that pooled in my mouth at her rapidly moving blood.

"Why am I still here? I want to die." Dorothy sobbed up to the sky like she was talking to God. "Let me be with them."

I wondered about the plural she spoke of and thought about how Emmett told me he had six sisters and I'd only seen three today. I thought of the six children that had died as babies, and how Emmett was the only boy to survive.

Dorothy wanted death in a similar way that I wanted death, as freedom and release, but somehow… The way she spoke of dying now seemed wrong.

"Dorothy, living… it's a gift." I spoke my own selfishness, wanting to be in her shoes again no matter if her shoes were worn and maimed and her story was tragic.

"No. My life has been… miserable. I don't want to live it anymore." Dorothy said, totally convinced of this. "I'm so… tired… and with Emmett gone there's…. no point."

She sobbed uncontrollably, ducking her head as it got heavier.

My dead heart wrenched in my chest.

"Dorothy, you're young and beautiful and you have so much life to live. You can fall in love and have babies and…" I went on with the dreams that filled my own head so I was convinced they had to fill her head too.

"No, none of that is for me anymore." She sobbed, but something sharp resembling anger seemed to build up inside her.

"Oh yes, it is. You're..." I almost said human…

"No. I can't." Dorothy argued with me. "I'm... not that kind of girl anymore…"

It didn't make sense to me, and I pushed harder.

"You're a _beautiful_ girl, and you'd make a lovely wife for any man. He'd take care of you, and love you, and you could be a mother, and have beautiful children and grandchildren, and… be… _happy_." I realized I was getting carried away and ancient pain radiated through my limbs.

Dorothy snorted a humorless laugh.

Even in her starvation and battered state, she was beautiful. She had to be the prettiest girl in town…

I knew what that was like, and somehow I thought of it as a curse…

Maybe…

Maybe she did too.

"Nobody'd ever marry a girl like me." She said, discouragement and disillusion in her broken voice.

"But…" I started to protest.

"Vivien… I'm not… _fit _for marriage anymore." Dorothy looked over at me with wide eyes. "Don't you understand?…"

All at once she willed me to understand, but also hoped I wouldn't.

Then, I thought back to my own fears that I let fester in my gut.

My stomach dropped and I immediately felt anxiousness that I didn't know how to process. I didn't know what to say.

Just her presence now illuminated my darkest thoughts, but something told me to keep pressing.

"Where did you get those bruises on your neck?" I asked softly, already feeling like I knew.

She frowned, immediately angry.

"It's none of your business." She snapped with the roll of the thunder, the sky opening up into a summer rain.

"Dorothy, you can talk to me." I said in the softest voice I could muster, trying to find some sort of relation point to her that wouldn't cause me to have to bare my broken soul too. "I think I understand."

"No, you don't." She snapped, frowning and turning away from me, storming off to the shelter of a barn that had been empty of animals for quite some time.

I reacted how she hoped I would, but also hoped I wouldn't.

"Yes. I do." I said with conviction, following her closely out of the rain.

"What do you know in your pretty little _princess_ world about what I've been through?" She spat fierily under the meager shelter of the barn's patchy roof.

"More than you realize." I found a dry area close to her and she looked at me with wide, fearful eyes.

She decided she knew that Emmett hadn't told me her story. He would never.

I wonder if he even knew.

But, I did.

I knew.

I knew because it happened to me.

I'd never told anyone, and I swore I never would.

I wished there was another way, but there wasn't

I was scared to tell her my story, and I was still so irrationally ashamed of it. I thought that maybe if I wasn't beautiful... maybe if I dressed more modestly. Maybe I had worn too much rouge. Maybe I had batted my eyes too freely.

My mother always said not to tempt men. They couldn't help their impulses. They couldn't help it. That's just the way boys are.

I was asking for it...

And, I relived my punishment every single day.

But conviction poured over me and I sensed her struggles were my struggles.

And, just like her duplicitous expectations earlier, I had my own. I hoped she didn't experience what I had, but if I was going to tell her, I hoped I was right…

"A couple years ago, I was at my friend's house. It was just a week before my wedding. She had the most…_ darling_ baby." I thought of Henry with perfect recollection.

Even his precious, baby scent filled my nose.

I clenched my jaw.

"It was only a few blocks home. I didn't think I needed a chaperone." I started, my knees feeling weak so I sat down on an old stool.

There was another empty stool in this dry patch under the leaking roof of the barn that Dorothy could take when she was ready.

She was far from it though, so I had to continue.

"I was engaged to be married to the most eligible bachelor in town… He was… handsome and wealthy and well-mannered… My parents approved… Everyone was jealous of me… My life… was _perfect_." I spoke through my teeth, rage making my venom flare in my veins. "Everything I ever wanted… was right within reach."

"But… I saw him on my way home from my friend's that night…" My voice shook and Dorothy softened, her eyes finally finding their way over to me even though I couldn't look at her.

"He was… _drunk_…" I swallowed nervously tasting the rain as it diluted the taste of her mildly tantalizing scent.

I couldn't even think of it though.

I was in Rochester…

"And… he was with some friends, some that I'd never met." I breathed. "Sons of other rich men."

Dorothy sat down beside me now, her eyes wide but soft and opened.

I still couldn't look at her. I wondered if I'd have to say anymore or if she could just guess.

"It was cold, too cold for April… His friends told him that I was… too covered up…"

Dorothy exhaled now, as if a large weight had been lifted off her chest at my own heavy words.

"I'm sorry." Dorothy breathed sincerely and emotionally.

I looked up and noticed tears were streaming down her face. I was right. This was cathartic for her.

My stomach twisted and turned because I hated I was right.

No woman should ever…

"They all eventually got their justice." I clenched my jaw in encouragement, imagining their brutal deaths that still didn't seem like enough for what they'd done to me.

She wasn't a stranger, but it was so much easier to talk to her…

A woman who knew…

This opened up a part of my thoughts that was dark and terrible…

It could send me deep, fast if I let it.

But now… something was different.

Now, I didn't want to let it.

Because for the first time, I had told _someone_ and now that my wounds had been ripped anew, I wanted to _heal._

For the first time, I believed _maybe I could_.

"Good." Dorothy swallowed nervously, her voice cracking with emotion.

She'd experienced a similar catharsis. Maybe… just maybe she wanted to heal now too.

I nodded confidently feeling a lot more sure about her than I was about myself.

"You are not whatever happened to you." I said with wisdom I didn't know I had. "It's not who you are."

I frowned, wondering where this had come from and why still I didn't feel like I could truly take my own advice and liberate myself from what Royce had done to me.

Dorothy nodded with a sad exhale that was like deflating a balloon.

"Lately it's felt like that's... _all_ I am." Dorothy sighed with deep sadness. "But maybe... one day I can be more than all this again."

I nodded in encouragement.

Now though with a glimmer of confidence that I had given her, Dorothy began her story too.

"I was more once. So much more." Dorothy bit her bottom lip though I knew this story already had a tragic end but I couldn't truly imagine how tragic.

"Em and I were a lot more similar back then because I always wanted to be more like him. I'd follow him around and try to copy him and be just like him, but I didn't realize how hard it was going to be. He was real special, and only he could be that way. He was the only one strong enough."

"I remember how he always had a smile on his face, he'd make games out of work, he'd find fun in the boring, he'd laugh when everyone else was ready to cry, he'd... Emmett was really like... sunshine. I mean, you know. He makes everything... brighter." Dorothy smiled lightly.

"I know." I couldn't stop my own little smile.

"But he was _always _like that for as long as I can remember. He was always smiling, always happy, and always friendly. He'd make fast friends with strangers when we went to town."

"He was... _always_ a people person." Dorothy smiled and I couldn't help but mirror her smile. "So it made me try to be to."

"And it didn't matter how rich or poor they were, he treated em _all _like they were kings and queens and I guess he expected other people'd do the same. I don't know if he told you, but Emmett and I grew up different than this. I remember like it was a dream of another life, but we lived in Alabama with land and money and a big house full of servants that did everything for us, and our bellies were always full." Dorothy spoke with wistfulness.

"I had candies every. single. day. I'm not even lyin. But, we was about five or six or so when Emmett and I found out what it meant to be poor. Our Pa... well he bought this land, wanting to make something of himself and have something of his own and not live off my mother's family's money forever I guess. But things went sour _real_ fast. There was a bad deal that put us out of a place to live and most all our money." Dorothy narrowed her eyes.

"Our family was too big for any of the places in town, but we couldn't have afforded it anyhow so we ended up with all this land but nowhere to live. We found an old house that used to belong to some sharecroppers and my ma was convinced she could fix it up so here we've been ever since fighting for our lives and working every day cause of our Pa's pride." Dorothy snorted.

"That's when Em and I started to understand class. We started to understand unreasonable hate. Grown adults would call us trash to our faces when we'd go into town for supplies. Especially when Emmett and I made friendly with the Sanders family…"

Dorothy's eyes went dark now.

I didn't understand.

"They worked our land for shares you see, and they live just down the way. Emmett was too damn friendly not to speak as he worked so close alongside em."

"Our Pa didn't lift a finger except to hit us, so when Em worked our land, he got closer to Sam Sanders and his Pa. Sam was about our age, and he was working our land too - for his family's shares, so he and Em made fast friends, and Mr. Sanders taught Em how to be a man like our own Pa never would." Dorothy said.

"Emmett loved Sam, but it was also an open rebellion against our Pa every time Em spoke to him." Dorothy's smile was long gone now as she frowned.

I puzzled.

"When we were thirteen or so, Em broke up a fight outside of town. A group of boys had been picking on Sam's little sister Bonnie. Em broke one of their noses, and it just happened to be a cop's kid…" Dorothy sighed.

"And when Em took Bonnie's hand and walked her home, that just about sealed it. People talked from here to the county line about Emmett being... well, you know…" Dorothy trailed off with an annoyed look on her face.

I didn't know.

"My Pa was so embarrassed, God, he hit Emmett so hard he couldn't walk for days." Dorothy recalled, shuddering. "We all thought he'd beat him to death, but Emmett's too damn proud and stubborn. He took a beating that'd kill any right minded person and just smiled all smug and satisfied at him."

Dorothy laughed a little, darkly and deeply before she lost to a coughing fit.

I felt my hands ball up into fists. I couldn't imagine something like that and I didn't want to. It was hellish.

"Why?" I finally asked.

Dorothy tilted her head a little, like she couldn't possibly understand my ignorance.

"Oh… Miss Vivien…" Dorothy's brow furrowed and she looked away from me, blushing. "I s'pose I forgot to mention the Sanders are black…"

I'd lived a very VERY sheltered life when it came to racial strife, and the experience of it in the Deep South just on the other side of the days of the Confederacy was amplified to a barbaric, lawless extent. Racism existed in New York, sure; it was 1935, but here in the South… It was entirely different.

Something called… Jim Crow laws…

I had a sour taste in my mouth as I looked back at Dorothy though. Dorothy just nodded with pain in her eyes that I'd never understand.

"I'm sorry." I didn't know what to say.

"No, Emmett always knew he didn't do nothing wrong. He just… treated people fair. Even people like my Pa that didn't deserve it." Dorothy exhaled wistfully. "And, I always just wanted to be just like Emmett… Have a heart as big as his was…"

I admired that about him too, loving learning details about him through her eyes.

"Even though our father didn't approve, Em would constantly be raising some sort of ruckus with Sam. You could hear em from here to the state line horsing around. Oh, how they'd laugh." Dorothy was filled with ancient sadness. "Sometimes they'd pull pranks on me… Put frogs in my bed… Like… _children_…"

The corner of her mouth lifted slightly.

"I'd always fancied Sam too but in a _different_ way than Em did..." Dorothy said.

I knew where this was going.

I felt it tragically.

"I remember for our sixteenth birthday, Em and I went dancing outside of town. I'd made a new dress and I'd braided some flowers my sister Caroline had picked for me in my hair. Sam was there that night, and he asked Em if he could ask me to dance..."

She giggled at the memory.

"Em was all at once the happiest and most nervous person in the room - besides me and Sam of course. I danced with Sam and... he told me I looked beautiful."

Dorothy's eyes lit up like fluorescents before they flickered out.

"I was too naive to know what it meant, but…" Dorothy sighed. "I easily fell in love with Sam."

I watched the way she spoke of him, studying the way her eyes flickered like candlelight in the torrential downpour.

"We were careful and secret for years because we were both just afraid of going to jail."

I remembered a pair like them was illegal here and it made my stomach turn. I didn't understand.

I watched Dorothy talk about him with admiration and wonder and love…

"I was _so_ in love with him. Oh God, I was so in love... We were gonna run away to Europe or something; we just needed a little more money to get out of here…" Dorothy mumbled.

"But, then... I… got pregnant…" Dorothy had such pain in her tone that made me want to cry.

"I was so skinny I barely showed so I guess I was lucky…" Dorothy started to cry now. "But… But time was running out that I could hide it…"

She wiped her eyes.

"Dorothy..." I exhaled her name tragically, unable to fathom her experience if this was just the prologue for context.

"It didn't matter though. I had the baby too early… She was too little…" She wiped her eyes now. "My mama said it was God's wrath… That He killed my baby because… because she was… an abomination of God…"

Dorothy sobbed.

Death was heavy in her voice, heavy on her face. Her sunken eyes and hollow cheeks seemed to deepen and darken.

"I couldn't believe that though…" Dorothy sobbed into her hands. "'cause God, she looked like one of His angels… So peaceful and… beautiful…"

My heart was shattered into a thousand pieces.

"She was perfect." Dorothy breathed darkly. "When Em saw her, he said she had my nose. She was too pretty to have my nose…"

"But when my _parents _saw her…" Dorothy's voice cracked. "Immediately, they knew… They knew what I'd done… They knew…"

My soul felt squashed and ripped in two.

"But, even my Pa wouldn't raise a hand to me that day…" Dorothy's voice was haunting.

"Em was so kind to arrange a place for her on the hill over the river a couple miles South. He secretly fetched Sam too… for me… For _us_ to… grieve… We went late that night, so no one'd catch us…" Dorothy cried new tears, unimaginable grief in her voice.

"A few days passed where nothing had changed and aside from my lost baby…. and my parents's harsh silence, nothing more _truly_ terrible had happened."

I couldn't imagine anything more terrible than what she'd already told me and I wanted to tell her I couldn't handle any more, but _she_ needed to open up to me.

It wasn't about me.

"I'd just started to feel safe again, when they ripped me out of my bed in the middle of the night. I'd heard stories… But, they're scarier than you'd ever imagine... Vivien, I'll never forget waking up to those... those monsters… Like… Ghosts… God… it's white hot and burned in my eyes."

She cried.

I had never heard of anything like this in my life, and it absolutely shattered me. I didn't understand.

"They tied me up and put a bag over my head so I wouldn't see where we were going; once we got there and they pulled the bag off, I was convinced I was in hell." Dorothy said hauntingly.

It seemed to kill her and heal her all at once to finally tell somebody.

"They had Sam there... tied up like... like an animal." Dorothy covered her mouth with a shaking hand and looked down. "He was already beaten up real bad... But, but they made sure they kept him alive…"

"They told him he had to keep his eyes open and watch or they'd kill me..." Dorothy swallowed. "They told me after I had a _proper_ man, I'd be cured... That, I... could be _freed_ of my _affliction_. That I could be _fixed_… with enough…"

Her face was full of disgust and horror and I imagined mine was too. I was in physical pain over her story, and the weight on my chest got heavier.

I was sick now, unable to imagine hearing any more.

"But when they were finished with me, that's when they finally killed Sam, and I thought they were going to kill me too, but they didn't have the mercy." She sobbed, and I was broken hearted.

"They dropped me just outside of… the fight club… I mean, where… Emmett was working that night. They knew where he was because they were comin' for him next. I was still too shaken up to realize it though."

"Emmett knew immediately what they'd done to me. I'd _never_ seen Emmett cry. Never. But God, Vivien, he broke in two in front of all those people. I'd never seen him like that. And it scared me to death. God, it scared me to death." Dorothy said, but she wasn't done.

I wanted to cry. I wanted to scream.

All of it. All at once.

"I hadn't started processing just how bad it all really was until I saw Emmett's face." Dorothy swallowed and I couldn't even imagine.

"But after he got sad, he got drunk and _angry_…" Dorothy went on. "He went looking for them. He had an idea of who they were… I didn't want him to tell me."

"He went looking for them with the intent to kill them. I begged him not to go. I'd never seen so much rage in someone in my life, and that's the last time I saw him.… Because then, he was arrested and I just knew they were in on it… They knew where he was… They knew where he'd be… They were in on it. They're all so corrupt."

Dorothy clenched her teeth. I saw how this filled all the holes in Emmett's story now. It made my skin crawl.

I had my own experience with corrupt police officers. I knew all about that.

"They've come back for me, night after night since Emmett's been gone. Randomly, so I'd never know when they'd come... Sometimes it'll be days. Others, it's every night. They insist I need more '_conversion' _so…"

Dorothy clenched her teeth, and I was shaking with anger. No. Way.

"Sometimes I think the waitin' and the not knowing's worse… I just… stay… _afraid_… All… the… time…"

The markings on her weren't from her father after all.

But her parents knew. They knew and they didn't do a damn thing about it.

Honestly, maybe they _couldn't_.

No one could.

But, she wasn't safe here. _None_ of them were.

"Dorothy, listen to me." I stood authoritatively, interrupting her.

"You have to get out of here." I told her strongly. "You can't stay here anymore."

Dorothy looked at me sadly.

"But Ruthie..."

"No, Dorothy, I'm serious. Emmett would tell you to listen to me." I insisted in a panic. "He wanted you to get out of here…"

I knew it was probably true.

She swallowed.

"Here." I pulled out the remaining cash from my purse not having the time to empty it before I'd followed her out the door. "It's almost five thousand dollars and if you need more, you write me, all right? I can give you anything you ever need for as long as you live. Take this and get out of town."

"I can't write." She snorted.

"Dorothy, listen." I willed her to listen to me, regardless. "You just _have_ to get out of here. No matter what."

Finally, she didn't protest.

"But, where would I go? What would I do?" Dorothy mumbled.

My mind raced.

I knew exactly what she'd do.

I clenched my hands into fists.

"I'll come for you tonight. After everyone's asleep. You have to run." I told her.

Her eyes went wide.

"What if the Klan's come too?…"

I wanted to tell her I'd kill them all.

"They're never going to touch you again, Dorothy. I swear to God." I told her intensely, so intensely I watched her shiver.

I had to reel in my predatory side, because subconsciously she registered it and she was now subconsciously fearful of me.

I'd find out who they were… I'd kill them.

"What about Annie and Ruthie?" Dorothy mumbled, still apprehensive.

"That's enough money in there with your parents, they can both go to school. Things can be better for them than they were for you. They'll get out of here too. But, you… you have to get far."

"Okay…" She finally agreed, and I thought I heard hopefulness in her voice.

I heard the door open of the house and I knew someone was coming to check on us so I motioned Dorothy forward as we started back.

Our eyes lingered because we knew about the rogue mission we were embarking on.

Her father stood near the front door with impossibly black eyes, rain pouring down his stoic face.

I wondered who he'd been before the war. I wondered if the war was even to blame anymore…

"Dorothy, stop actin a cryin fool and y'all come in outta the rain." He said gruffly, but under it all I did imagine there was concern for his little girl and radiating sadness over his lost son.

But, maybe there wasn't.

Dorothy didn't say a word as she ducked her head shamefully into the door of the house.

Emmett's father didn't follow, and I still smelled him outside the door when it shut behind us.

It was too quiet for anyone but me to hear it, but I heard him start to cry when he was alone and walking further and further away from the house.

I furrowed my brow not truly understanding.

Tears hadn't been far from the eyes of the other three McCarty girls, and their sadness had made the air thick and heavy as I followed Dorothy back in the house.

My eyes did finally meet Emmett's mother's and I mustered up enough courage to finally say it.

"Use that money to get out of here." I boldly suggested once silence filled the air.

Everyone looked back up at me like I was a ghost with five heads.

Annie's eyes were impossibly wide and confused.

"You can run." I breathed. "Emmett would want you to run."

Emmett's mother frowned.

"You barely knew him." She snorted. "You don't know _anything _about what he'd want for us…"

Somehow her accusation that Emmett was just a stranger to me hit me where it hurt…

"I know you shouldn't have to live like this." I said, nervous and scared since she was pushing back.

"We're doing fine… It's just a… rough patch…" She said, and I heard her heart quicken.

I didn't understand her hold up. Why was she still here? Why was she so deep in this hell she couldn't see she needed to take her children and get out? Why was she so addicted to this domestic life of… of _servitude_?!

"Mom. We're _not_ fine." Dorothy interrupted strongly.

The air was heavy.

"Ruthie's getting worse. Annie needs a doctor. And… And I… I can't do this anymore." Dorothy's eyes were wide and filling with tears. "We're _not_ fine."

Emmett's mother's bottom lip trembled and her eyes got glassy too.

She cleared her throat.

I almost thought she'd cave, but that's when she turned toward me with fiery betrayal and distaste in her eyes.

"Get out." She finally told me fiercely, and when she grimaced I saw Emmett's dimples on her cheeks.

"You can take your money." She growled.

"No… It's… yours…"

She didn't say anything, just stared at me.

It left a sour taste in my mouth as I nodded and clenched my jaw.

"Mom, you _know_ she's right." Dorothy hissed.

That's when Mrs. McCarty did something that shocked me, she slapped Dorothy straight across her face, as if she was accusing her for starting _all _of this.

I almost gasped at the sharp crack of Helen McCarty's hand on Dorothy's already battered face, but more than that the explosion of pent up emotion behind it. But also, such deeply rooted hatred was evident in her eyes that I imagined it was much more complex than just this snowball of situations.

I imagined she'd _resented_ her daughter for years. She was _jealous_ of her daughter's beauty and youth. She was angry that she'd _wasted_ her good looks on love and her young years on a failed motherhood. She was afraid Dorothy would be an old maid. She was upset that Dorothy had been her best chance back to a life of aristocracy and money. She wanted a wealthy, Southern husband for Dorothy that carried a good name and an even deeper pocket book. She wanted _more_, and Dorothy had failed her. Dorothy had no desire to be used as a pawn or a tool for her parents to climb out of this hole, to wear dresses and gloves like the ones I had on…

Dorothy wasn't a tool like I'd been for my parents…

Apparently this all had struck a nerve in Helen McCarty at once.

Ruthie sensed the tension and started crying again, but still not a word came out of her mouth.

Annie looked over at me, her own jaw clenched resolutely but tears streaming down her desperate face.

She was strong. If she got through this sickness, she might survive it all.

"I said get. out." Helen McCarty looked over at me in anger.

Finally, my eyes lingered on Dorothy, hoping this wasn't the last time I saw her face.

She nodded resolutely.

Now, I painfully knew it wasn't.

—

* * *

The air was thick and muggy, heavy with the blackness of midnight.

Change filled the air, and in the still of the night I felt a chill run up my spine.

I was glad I could see well in the dark because I still barely noticed Dorothy finally approaching - _alone_. Her black hair was black as the night and as her limited human eyes finally found me, she picked up her pace, nervousness evident in her.

My dead heart rose to my throat.

My automobile was a little off the road, back down the path. I'd walked the rest of the way. I didn't want to be heard. I looked around for evidence that we weren't alone, but tonight we undoubtedly were.

Dorothy grinned in expectation as she came closer, but I noticed tears in her eyes. She was anxious. I heard it in her thudding pulse.

I was glad I'd gone hunting in the break of time.

"It's going to be okay." I breathed softly, and she nodded, biting her bottom lip.

She didn't have a stitch of baggage to her name. Nothing was materially attached enough to her to leave with.

She was empty handed.

"I know. It doesn't make it any easier though." She mumbled.

"They'll be all right." I lied the best I could, trying to put on a brave face for her.

For a second Dorothy and I just stood there while she let her big blue eyes scan the land she'd been raised on. She sighed, deepening her inhale as if she was trying to remember what it smelled like years and years from now. She took mental photographs, seeming incredibly decided about leaving this place that was all at once her home and her hell.

Then, she turned her back on it all like I'd never really been able to do, and we started to walk down the path toward where I'd hidden my car.

She crossed her arms over her chest and kept her gaze down. I wondered what was going through her mind. Maybe then, I'd know what to say.

"Where am I going to go? What am I going to do?" She worried quietly, taking this responsibility from me and speaking into the silence.

I still knew exactly the answer to this question.

"Somewhere you'll be safe; somewhere _very_ far away." I told her, then I looked at what she was wearing, knowing she'd attract attention as a foreigner in rags.

I veered off to a wooded cover right before where we'd turn to get to the car.

"Here. Wear this." I started unbuttoning my own dress.

"What are you doing?" She raised an eyebrow.

"You need a proper dress where you're going." I told her.

She did. She needed to look like a proper society girl who'd just moved to town after the death of her parents and mysterious uncle…

"And you'd wear rags?" She was skeptical.

"It's only temporary." I insisted, and began to slip out of my dress so I was standing in front of her in my skivvies.

I was modest so of course I tittered, waiting vulnerably with my hand outstretched waiting for her to take my dress.

"Come on." I urged her, handing her my dress.

Dorothy huffed and took my dress and began to modestly get out of her own.

I tried not to look at her, but I did. She had bruises and cuts and burns all over her body. She was tattooed with pain, and it made me sick.

I couldn't imagine. Life would be unimaginably better for her outside of this

She handed her dusty rose colored button front cotton frock to me, keeping her eyes off me as I slipped her dress over my head and she got into mine.

It fit her like a glove, though it was a little loose on her skeletal shoulders and hips, obviously not tailored for her.

"Will you let me do your hair?" I asked, taking the pins out of my fascinator hat so I could fix it in her own.

"As long as you don't mind lice?" Dorothy snickered as I slipped off my gloves and handed them over to her.

"Oh, I'll be fine." I said, putting a pin between my teeth as Dorothy turned so I could get my fingers in her long black hair. With my vampire sight, I picked the lice and eggs out of her hair with ease.

"God, your hands are freezing!" She flinched.

"Sorry. Bad circulation." I mumbled, working my fingers into her braid so I could pull her hair back off her long, swan's neck.

She accepted this as true without much questioning.

I rolled her hair back like a true society woman, and there was something incredibly intimate about doing her hair. I imagined some sort of cosmic connection to her family line, and how in a way Emmett's blood flowed in her veins and he could live on in her and her children. Maybe a tiny piece of me could too… Figuratively.

I took my high heels off so I noticed she was exactly my height as we swapped shoes.

Dorothy's shoes were black lace up boots worn down to their last fiber. I could feel the gravel under the balls of my feet as if the shoes didn't even have soles.

No matter for me, but it did break my heart these were the kinds of shoes she had to wear.

Dorothy's foot was just a little smaller than mine, but it'd be all right temporarily.

She looked like a regular society lady now.

She was... _beautiful_.

"Now how's this gonna help anything?" She gestured down to her Cinderella make over.

"Here." I started on a note as I pulled a pen and stationery from my purse. I was thanking God I still carried proper stationery. My mom always told me that you always needed to be prepared to write a thank you note.

"Go to this address. Rochester, New York. Ask for Vera." If I'd had a heart it would be racing.

Dorothy frowned.

"What?"

"She'll take you in." I assured her though I didn't know if it was true.

"Tell everyone your parents died in a tragic fire, back in Alabama, and you tried to track down your great uncle. Last you heard he was in Rochester but you haven't been able to find him yet."

Dorothy registered what I said with a nod.

"Tell her your name... Tell her your name is Rosalie. Rosalie McCarty." I spoke in a confident tone, but I felt the weight of this name on my tongue.

It was a special name. It would hold weight with Vera too. It'd soften her heart to Dorothy, and… and it was selfishly special to me too.

"Why?"

"So you won't be found." I reasoned.

She took this as a good enough answer.

"Tell her you'd like to be hired on as a nanny. She has a baby named Henry. Tell her all you'll require is a place to stay. She will protect you and care for you while you get on your feet." I promised and knew this much would be true.

Dorothy didn't protest like I imagined she would. She was eager for escape, and she jumped at the opportunity.

Instead, she just nodded.

"Well, all right. Call me Rosalie!" She twirled in a circle, looking down at her new self.

My dead heart hurt like a sore bruise.

"All right. Now let's get you to the train station." I redirected before I'd get too emotional as we walked, totally trading places on this path.

I had to admit, I was acting selfishly and I even knew it plainly. I wanted her to take my name because I was also giving her the life I imagined for myself. She'd be able to start over and sport the name I would've if I'd been married to Emmett in the normal, uncomplicated real world like I'd said I was… Dorothy'd get to fall in love again and get married and have babies…

She'd live as Rosalie McCarty when I never could've.

Maybe this would even be the name on her tombstone after she'd grown old and grey haired, surrounded by grandchildren.

A name is vitally important, and incredibly personal. After all I'd shared with her, the clothes we'd swapped, and after all the parts of our souls we'd bared, this seemed so simple, but it was… enough to make me finally crack.

"You know Dorothy…" I started, my voice shaky and weak. "After… what happened to me… I never imagined I'd be worthy of anyone's love ever again. I imagined I was... dirty and ruined. I was _used_... I imagined no one could _ever_ look past that part of me. I imagined I'd always be afraid, always withdrawn, always full of nightmares. I imagined I'd never find anyone that could make me feel loved and safe again."

It made butterflies flutter in my stomach.

I realized then I was exceptionally emotional in a way I'd never let myself be before and I felt real, excruciating pain reeling through my body.

"But then, you did. You found Emmett?" Dorothy's big blue eyes looked on me with openness and... a glimmer of hope.

I realized what she meant. I had told her we had married. I had told her he had theoretically accepted all of that baggage and weight.

I had told her that he had lightened my darkness…

It was merely a fairytale, but… its falsity gave her hope.

It just scared me to death. I had told her these things in an effort of catharsis, not a solved problem that ended in a promise of a fairytale. Would that even be the case? Right now, for me all of those things were still open-ended questions reeling in my mind.

"I did. I found Emmett." I breathed and was even able to give her a little throbbing smile.

My frozen heart was heavy and I imagined my limbs melting off my body.

I thought about Emmett with nervousness imagining if he could look at me like Dorothy was looking at me once he knew. I thought about whether or not he could make me feel safe and loved again as I'd described to her. I thought about whether he could bear my heavy burdens, and whether he'd even want to.

I was plagued with anticipating fear and I hadn't even told him.

We both slid into our respective seats in the car and closed the doors quietly behind us.

"Are you ready?" I asked, but in a way I was asking myself before I turned the keys.

I was giving someone my life, my dream, my clothes, my _name_…

But, Dorothy'd given me someone to talk to about what happened to us when we never imagined telling anyone else about it. She'd given me _closure_. She'd given me confidence. She'd given me hope. She'd given me priceless insight on Emmett. She'd given _me_ a new life too.

She'd given me something bigger than myself and my immortality.

She'd given me the thought that maybe just maybe I could heal… Maybe I didn't have to be what happened to me forever. I didn't have to be defined and weighted by what happened to me.

I could change.


	10. Seven Devils (Part I)

I am so sorry for my delay! I have been super busy with my master's degree and I reworked some things over and over to get it right, but this ultimately is what felt best. Thank you so much for your love and support and time reading this. This chapter is one of the last ones setting up their early relationship so wooo get ready for some ExR coming soon!

I'd love your thoughts, and reviews and I appreciate your time sending them to me!

These chapters were VERY hard to write though in the emotional sense. It is HEAVY, and I understand this deals with a lot of dark topics. Because of that TRIGGER WARNINGS EXIST FOR THESE CHAPTERS.

TW/ CW: Abuse, violence, suicide

* * *

_**Seven Devils**_

_Holy water cannot help you down_  
_Hours and armies couldn't keep me out_  
_I don't want your money_  
_I don't want your crowd_  
_See I have to burn_  
_Your kingdom down_

_Seven devils all around you_  
_Seven devils in my house_  
_See they were there when I woke up this morning_  
_I'll be dead before the day is done_

* * *

**Edward **\- _Betrayal_

Emmett's thoughts betrayed him of course, so I knew where Rosalie had gone before Carlisle even asked him when we got back to the house and it was empty of her.

Apparently, she'd lied to Esme and said she was just going to town, but Emmett didn't have it in him to lie so now the four of us inhabited the same room filled with nervous energy not knowing what could come of Rosalie's carelessness in going to see his family.

I knew Rosalie was doing this for Emmett, but mostly she was doing this for herself and his view of her. She was so selfish sometimes that it clouded her judgment. I was still concerned that she'd gone to meet them and talk with them and allow stories and rumors to circulate with her name and description around them.

If Rosalie could control her thirst that was.

Who was I even kidding? Rosalie had sickening, borderline annoying self control that wasn't noble like Carlisle's. Her control was more long-suffering and motivated by vanity, so I don't know why I even imagined she couldn't control herself, but that didn't mean she could totally be _trusted_ around humans. What if they noticed something off or different about her?

What if the weather forecast on the radio was wrong and it suddenly became sunny?

I didn't have much more time to fume over the piano at Rosalie's constant selfishness and thoughtlessness, because I heard her outside, walking up the front steps in a trudge.

Her shoes didn't sound like hers, but her scent came in with the rain so I knew it was her and my fingers slowed on the keys.

Her scent was mingling with that of a human's in a way that was so strong I was curious.

Rosalie's thoughts were lazy and unformed like she was thinking in cursive letters or in a drunken stupor even though this was impossible, and so nothing betrayed her inner workings to me.

As muddled as Rosalie's thoughts were, Emmett's were equally as sharp with concern. He stood, opening the door for her before she had even reached for the door knob.

Immediately they inhaled in unison, and he met her eyes as she stood outside in the summer rain, drenched and downtrodden like he'd never seen her before.

She saw him differently now, but her thoughts were so wild I couldn't put my finger on what it was about her perspective that had changed.

I hadn't even turned my head, but I saw her so clearly in his mind, it was like I'd looked before I even saw her.

She was wildly different to him in this moment. He saw her differently too.

His lens had changed now, but… so had she.

He noticed first that her blonde hair was uncharacteristically unfixed and uncovered, free to flow around her face and stick to her long neck in the rain.

Then, he noticed the look on her face.

"Rose." Emmett's eyes were desperate for her, registering her state from where he stood just over the threshold.

His fingers dug into the frame of the door from where he'd held it open to stare at her.

She smelled like a human…

But, not even he could register that much in his newborn mind.

He was panicked over something else entirely.

Rosalie was wearing Emmett's sister's boots and her very favorite dress.

"Rosalie, what?…" Carlisle was calm and understanding, but concern and worry was evident in his voice - not just for Rosalie's well being, but for our secret's integrity.

Had she let it slip?

Her thoughts didn't betray her, and I turned the corner to finally to see her standing on the front porch in a way I'd never imagine I'd see her. She was dirty, messed up, rained on, and wearing rags. The dusty rose colored button front dress had a muted floral pattern that had long been worn out and washed away. Rosalie didn't have her hair done, and perhaps most shockingly…

She was without her long time security blanket of pretentious snow white gloves on her fingers.

"Are you okay?" Emmett, interrupting Carlisle like no one else on the planet existed but he and Rosalie.

She nodded, looking up at him with huge golden eyes like something was on the tip of her tongue.

Actually, there were a million things on the tip of her tongue. Her thoughts ran through them all.

"And… she's all right?" He said in a half question.

_Dorothy_.

The black haired one. His twin.

Rosalie just nodded again knowing exactly whom he cared to ask for first. A ghostly removal floated in her eyes like she'd done something terrible.

Rosalie's thoughts were inharmonious with her nod to Emmett. I saw nothing but struggle and violence and hell surrounding his sister Dorothy. She was covered in bruises and cuts…

I stared at Rosalie, hoping she felt the weight of my eyes, but she didn't.

She couldn't.

I realized then that _she_ hadn't done something terrible. No, something awful had _happened_ \- something that had Rosalie feeling out of control and weakened.

I couldn't read anything substantial or telling in her mind as I usually could, and I frowned.

This genuinely concerned me now.

Emmett sensed this as he looked over at me, and the unknown terrified him.

I clenched my jaw as I felt Carlisle and Esme's watchful eyes on me _also_ looking for answers.

"And the rest of them?" Emmett wondered, acknowledging Rosalie hadn't told him about the rest of his family and perhaps this was why she was downtrodden and hesitant.

Rosalie looked up at him with failure in her big, round eyes

Immediately he thought of death, but it was somehow worse in Rosalie's perspective.

"They miss you." Rosalie went on, using the tenderest voice I'd ever heard her use.

Her voice shook nervously.

She looked up at him with a trembling bottom lip.

The longer she and Emmett looked at each other like I'd never seen two people look at each other, the more vulnerable Rosalie got.

She was like a melting popsicle in the heat of July.

Eventually she burst into a tearless, wrecking fit of sobs.

But more surprisingly than all of that was how she reached both of her arms out for Emmett as the only comfort and lifeline during the hell, horror, and violence in her head.

He was just as surprised as she threaded her arms under his and around his waist, ducking her head into his chest as she cried her tearless tears.

"I know… I know…" Emmett spoke to her about something I couldn't understand, even reading their thoughts.

Suddenly, it felt incredibly intrusive to be in the room with them.

He cradled her head to his chest carefully, physically acting as a haven for her even though heartbreak and hurt was evident in his own eyes too. He used her as a haven too even if she didn't know it, and obvious pain reeled through him beyond the slow burn of a human scent to his throat.

"I'm… sorry…" Rosalie sobbed.

She was sorry for changing him and cursing him to a life she despised so much, but she was also sorry for something else...

All I could see in her mind were flashes of scenes she'd seen in her outing today.

Most significantly though, I saw dark bruises on battered women and girls.

I saw fear.

I saw tears.

I saw…

Oh God.

I immediately got a sour taste in my mouth.

Carlisle and Esme immediately looked at me like I would know what was going on, and I tried to hide my expression.

I don't think I even knew the half of it, but I knew Rosalie was reminded of a time when she'd been bruised and battered too.

It was all an unintelligible tangle of questions in everyone's heads and it was overwhelming me to try and process it all at once.

"I know…" Emmett sighed, holding her tight as she continued to cry.

But… he didn't.

He _didn't_ know. He didn't know exactly what she was struggling with about all this.

He just took it in the generally tragic sense, but he couldn't know what demon was running rampant in Rosalie's mind right now.

I looked down and away, hating this moment and hating what Rosalie had just thought in her uninhibited vulnerability.

This experience just further proved to her that men couldn't control themselves, particularly their anger, and particularly around women like her. She saw patterns. She saw repetition. Seeing the man that raised Emmett had left her thinking maybe he'd been raised to be the same, or at least he had it in him to be that way…

Rosalie didn't trust anyone, and this experience hadn't really helped to change that in a way, but something opened her up to Emmett now where she'd been previously unreachable.

Something had changed within her.

"Tell me they're all okay." Emmett requested after a long moment, having waited long enough now, and Rosalie's tears were worrying him that something terrible had befallen his little family.

"Ruthie's healthy… and happy _considering_." Rosalie answered after taking a shaky breath.

She knew this was why he sent her and she had to pull it together and report to him.

"Was she talking?" He asked a question that initially seemed strange, but in his thoughts I registered something about his sister that in later medical advances decades down the road would have been commonly diagnosed as some sort of autism spectrum disorder.

He and I would be sitting in a high school psychology class in 1994 when he'd first connect the dots, but he'd have nearly forgotten most of his specific human memories by then and not really remember why it made him sad…

He would have forgotten his sisters's names a few years prior.

Except Dorothy…

"No." Rosalie frowned, not aware of what Emmett's thoughts revealed to me.

Emmett's thoughts revealed that at one time… Ruthie _did_ speak and function socially, but she was no longer in an environment in which she could continue development. Too much had changed around her and the constant shadow of the death of her family members caused her to withdraw and regress. In another environment, Ruthie could have been thriving and healthy…

"And Annie?" He pushed, eager to know.

"Annie's…" Rosalie exhaled a little laugh which is something I'd never heard her do. "Just like you. She's strong, and bold, and quick witted. She's hunting. Dorothy taught her how to shoot a gun."

Emmett's dimples showed as he smiled down at Rosalie in his own little laugh. He was temporarily distracted by the things Rosalie had noticed about him, and seen in his sister.

He smiled and tried to be weightless, but he was still heavily weighed down with worry and questions.

"But, she needs a doctor." Rosalie swallowed, shifting from her previous lightness and recounts of pleasant happinesses to Emmett. "A good one."

His eyes went dark. He hadn't known she was sick. She wasn't before he'd been gone so he was worried and expecting the worst.

I heard Carlisle's thoughts rush with empathy and compassion, his frozen heart wrenching in ghost pain.

"I… gave your mother all the money and… I told her to run. To take your sisters with her." Rosalie said heavily. "But… But she said she wouldn't. She… _couldn't_."

Emmett clenched his jaw. I heard in his thoughts that he knew Rosalie's adverse reaction had something to do with his father.

Frustration, not at Rosalie, but at his mother for denying his sisters a better life than the one he'd had flared through his mind, but he focused.

Carlisle and Esme looked over at me now, trying to read me unsuccessfully.

"Rosalie…" Emmett spoke desperately but low and only to her, his eyes wide and open.

He was truly _sorry_.

Then, I noticed red hot anger and rage bubbling up like magma within him.

He hadn't wanted Rosalie to feel this way any more than he wanted to hear bad news. He wanted Rosalie to meet his family, to know them in a way that let her know _him_. In his idealism, he forgot that fighting is what his family does best these days and that they couldn't be normal for five seconds. He thought they'd pull it together for a guest - for someone as special as Rosalie… He wanted to be proud of them and proud of where he came from, but right now he was nothing but ashamed, and he hated feeling that way.

"Rosalie it's…" Emmett took a deep breath, his eyes darkening at the human scent on her, but even he couldn't bring himself to even think of the human scent as appetizing; just _painful and distracting._

"I… couldn't…" She admitted, thinking of nothing but her own failure.

I wondered briefly if this mission had been something egotistical that she couldn't accept this issue in his family had nothing to do with her, but I didn't cling to this thought too long.

"Hey, listen to me… It's all right." He told her with sincerity.

Rosalie nodded, but didn't truly accept his words. It wasn't all right yet.

"But about Dorothy… I have to tell you…" That's when Rosalie's thoughts betrayed the stupidest thing she had ever done in the history of her existence which was certainly saying a lot where I was concerned.

"What?!" I asked her aloud, unable to mask my surprise. "_You didn't_…"

Rosalie nodded, still not even looking at me or pulling away from Emmett.

"I did." She cried anew, covering her face by burying it in Emmett's chest.

"What happened?" Emmett asked her, panic in his eyes as he pushed back and away from her to make her look at him and answer honestly and up front.

"I sent… I sent Dorothy to Rochester to live with my old friend Vera. She's… on a train right now." Rosalie winced like he was going to explode and yell at her.

He didn't.

He reached for her again. His first thought was that he wanted to kiss her. His second was how hard it was not to.

He was relieved.

He didn't understand.

Carlisle's eyes widened and even _he_ looked slightly unnerved that Rosalie would do something so _stupid_.

"God damn it, Rosalie." I growled under my breath, immediately stressed.

Emmett looked at me like he could've killed me, and his thoughts told me he could have, but I didn't even return his glare. I was too worried.

"Rosalie…" Even Esme looked concerned about our secret.

"What was I supposed to do?!…" Rosalie's voice rose in pitch, panic setting in.

"She _couldn't_ stay there." She returned to a tiny, insecure voice.

Emmett looked like someone had all but impaled him, and he made a face that suggested something painful was brewing deep below the surface of his conscious as he looked away, trying to fight it.

Rosalie's eyes looked to him in a searching manner and the thought that '_he_ knew that _she_ knew' flew across her mind.

"I just… I thought she'd be safest there with Vera…" She said again, her exterior hardening as she pulled herself together. "They're the same age and…"

Her thoughts almost lined up with her words.

She gave Emmett's sister her clothes, her shoes, her hat, her gloves, her money…. and _her name_.

This was easily the dumbest thing of all.

Rosalie wanted Dorothy to be the reincarnation of Rosalie Hale…

She wanted a second chance for herself as well. She was really so unbelievably selfish.

I pinched the bridge of my nose, not wanting to lash out and kick her while she was down.

_Don't act so holier than thou, Edward. You can't afford to. _She yelled at me mentally.

"What's going to happen when she hears your name or sees your picture or?…" I began, reacting to the anger in her thoughts.

Emmett frowned, looking over at me.

"I didn't tell her my real name." Rosalie mumbled, crossing her arms over her chest.

I sighed.

"And your picture? You _already_ have plenty of stories floating around Rochester, Rosalie." I went on, resenting her.

"None that I created." Rosalie stupidly countered.

"Sure…." I snorted, thinking about the latest news cycle being littered with 'unexplainable murders' of five sons of rich men, including Royce King II….

People weren't that superstitious or quick to believe in ghosts and haunting, but something sinister had connected Rosalie Hale to these unexplainable murders in the minds of some people in Rochester…

She'd left a wedding dress in the place she'd killed Royce. I'd read the papers…

She _wanted_ people to connect his death to hers…

Even in her stupid wishes for haunting tales told for years to come, she was vain…

Anger flared in her eyes at my allusion to her killing spree.

"Both of you…" Esme exhaled, but she didn't know how to finish.

I knew she wanted us to stop fighting.

"Regardless, none of those stories would stick with her even if she heard them." Rosalie's eyes narrowed at me.

She really wasn't worried one bit.

"Rosalie. You _know_ the importance of concealing our existence." Carlisle said.

"Of course. And I've done nothing to compromise it!" She responded quickly, back on her game. "Nothing I did suggested _anything_ she could follow."

"You sent her to live _your_ life." I accused now.

Emmett looked at Rosalie now, and he wondered what that meant.

"You don't understand." Rosalie said to both of us in a growl though she was looking at me.

Her mind was concealed to me now that she wasn't vulnerable any more.

Maybe I didn't understand, but I couldn't see any other way to react to this careless neglect than paranoia.

"I did _nothing_ wrong." Rosalie insisted.

Emmett's watchful eyes were on her, darting over her face.

"And even if she _did_ suspect something it wouldn't be right, and who's going to believe her anyway? How would she even follow a fake name and a foggy description across a continent? Plus, the risk would be too great for her to say anything." Rosalie countered. "She _wanted_ out of there. She'll do whatever it takes not to have to go back. She'll play whatever role she has to play. She knows it's safer for her to never be found and… She… Can't…"

Rosalie's bottom lip started trembling again.

Emmett's already pale skin went paler, and he looked down at his feet.

That's when I heard it, from deeply suppressed in his painful thoughts…

My stomach dropped to the floor and he caught me looking at him, knowing I knew.

He clenched his jaw and looked away.

"Edward, we weren't there, so it's impossible to understand the entirety of the situation." Esme tried to reason with me, siding with Rosalie apparently now.

Something had shifted for everyone else too even though they couldn't read Emmett's mind, they saw his reaction and Rosalie's display of emotion.

Esme pitied Rosalie.

Who wouldn't after that emotional display? She was impossible to deny.

_I_ pitied her.

And I… I truly I hated to do so…

But, Carlisle pitied her too. Anyone that knew what happened to her would pity her.

"So… really though, what are we going to do about Dorothy?" I asked aloud.

Emmett and Rosalie both darted their eyes in my direction fierily.

"What do you mean what are we going to _do_ about her?" Emmett was defensive and on edge.

His paranoid newborn tendencies shone bright in his eyes.

"Well… We can't just let her…" I began.

"What are you even suggesting then?" Rosalie's voice was terrifying enough now to send a chill down even my spine.

Emmett and Rosalie looked like hell in all its fire and brimstone as they stared at me.

I didn't know what I was suggesting. We were powerless now.

Carlisle's thoughts overwhelmed me then as if he was speaking out loud.

"Edward, we could all very well be overreacting. I think Rosalie understands the grave importance of concealing our secret." Carlisle said aloud. "If she says nothing's at risk, I trust her judgment."

And he really and truly did trust her judgment.

He was sensitive to Rosalie in this way, and I knew it was a projection from his own relationship with Esme. In the beginning, Esme questioned herself and her judgement relentlessly because of her past when she had been unable to see the man she would marry would end up being abusive, controlling, and not who she thought he was.

She assumed this one judgment lapse filtered into her other decisions and so it paralyzed her often. Rosalie had a similar affliction, but had not yet realized it because she overcompensated for this insecurity through withdrawal and self reliance.

I softened to her plight, but I still didn't forget how careless this was.

My jaw clenched.

"Now, we'll let you both catch up before we have to regroup." Carlisle insisted. "We'll talk about this again with fresh heads."

_Just give them a moment alone. _Carlisle thought at me, but I barely heard him over the mental screaming that Emmett and Rosalie were doing in this moment.

Until Emmett and Rosalie were in the same room, I had no idea thoughts could be _so. loud._

I did hear Carlisle though, and so I nodded discreetly, before ultimately following he and Esme to the study.

Emmett and Rosalie barely knew we'd left the room because they were already deep in conversation and a connection that had been tethered with iron to just one another exclusively.

While they spoke, they hovered around one another, somehow privately and intimately connected without touching one bit.

It was unlike anything I'd ever seen, and I had to look away now.

They spoke so softly in a contradiction to their loud thoughts, only to one another that even to our vampire hearing, they were just a low hum when we were a couple doors down.

"Edward?" Esme's concern immediately became vocal.

I exhaled as the door shut behind us.

"I don't know…" I admitted, but I was sort of lying.

They waited silently.

"Rosalie saw some things today she wasn't ready for." I mumbled, feeling like I betrayed her as I told Carlisle and Esme.

Esme was just more deeply confused by these words. I thought about killing Esme's abusive husband, and how I could lapse on my morality once more and kill Emmett's father if I wanted…

He was exactly the kind of man that I would've easily disposed of.

"There's a lot of _violence_ in Emmett's family." I revealed, knowing it was not my story to tell. "He knows she's aware of it now."

Esme understood and a darkness filled her eyes. She swallowed, concerned for Rosalie now; even though I was still angry though and paranoid she'd ruined everything for us, I was concerned for her too.

_"_She wasn't ready." I whispered, keeping my eyes down. "I could've warned her if I'd known she…"

Carlisle placed a hand on my shoulder.

"No. Edward. You can't blame yourself." He was incredibly understanding and compassionate in a way I always wanted to be. "This is Rosalie's journey, and that's Emmett's business."

Esme looked down and away.

"But he couldn't have known how it would affect her." I defended. "He doesn't know… I do…"

"No, he couldn't have known. But, today was Rosalie's experience. She's strong. She'll be okay. She's just processing…" Carlisle nodded in encouragement to me again, and I admired him so. "And, that conversation would be different coming from you and you know it. She and Emmett will have it when she's ready. If it's necessary."

How could he be this incredible?

"He… will understand… What happened to Rosalie… Emmett's sister, Dorothy…" I connected the dots as the words heavily weighted my mouth.

"No…" Esme covered her mouth, unbelievable sadness in her eyes.

I nodded. I didn't know much, but I saw this connection within their thoughts.

"Rosalie talked to her… Like she hasn't talked to any of us." I told them.

Esme and Carlisle's eyes held deep emotions that prompted them to reach for each other's hands and intertwine their fingers.

The only thing darker than the root of our existence was Rosalie's reason for being like us.

"I truly didn't know what Royce and his friends were going to do to her. I hadn't heard anything in their thoughts that…" I trailed off, my thoughts going incredibly dark incredibly fast as Esme and Carlisle looked on.

I wanted to absolve myself to Carlisle, and have him state his approval and acceptance of me.

"I know that." Carlisle nodded. "Rosalie knows that. He fooled _everyone_."

"Even a mind reader…" I snorted, but I worried that maybe I didn't listen closely enough.

Then again, what could I have done? I couldn't have intervened… Could I?

"Edward, she doesn't blame you. It's just easier than blaming herself." Esme spoke in a trembling voice.

She let me into this insight that seemed incredibly personal to her too.

Her thoughts were tender and kind, but with a bit of an edge that only she could understand through her experience.

Esme spoke as if she could read Rosalie's thoughts in a way I couldn't… Esme saw the things inside Rosalie that she hadn't even connected within herself yet. I only read thoughts. I didn't read _people_.

Rosalie wasn't thinking and processing this healthily yet. She still had some growing to do. I thought maybe this experience would be a catalyst.

"What are we really going to do about Emmett's sister?" I asked extra quietly.

Carlisle and Esme's thoughts were unmoved.

"Rosalie seems convinced she hasn't revealed anything that would be of detriment." Carlisle reasoned with a sigh.

"Do you believe her?" I asked.

"I have to." Carlisle nodded resolutely, and his mind was made up.

* * *

**Dorothy **\- _Remind Me_

_I took a deep breath as I stood on the front porch of a beautiful yellow house with white shutters. There was a white porch swing and a lovely pink rose bush in the front yard. _

_It was in bloom. _

_My taxi driver insisted this was the right house, but it wasn't like I knew any better. I just hoped for the best as I clutched the bag full of money close to my middle. _

_I took a deep breath of the New York air, feeling change in every bit of oxygen. _

_My heart ached like the bruises on my skin that were now mostly covered with Vivien's white scarf. I wondered if I made the right decision. I grieved my lost family, my lost brother, my lost love, and I grieved Dorothy McCarty…_

_Everything that name meant was back in Tennessee, and though I grieved my home and my previous life, in a way… I felt lighter. I felt… free._

_That name had been attached to so many bad memories, so much tragedy, that now I got the chance to start over and become someone new…_

_Someone named _Rosalie.

_Who was I now? Who could I become?_

_It took all my courage to finally rap my knuckles on the door to Vera's. I expected this place to be some sort of haven, a shelter, a…_

_"Can I help you?" A woman about my age opened the door. _

_She had curly brown hair the color of chocolate that twisted in unruly ringlets down to her petite round shoulders. Her big green eyes were framed with a light constellation of freckles on her sun kissed skin. _

_Vera. _

_Immediately, I felt her warmth. _

_"Y-yes. I… I think you can." I stumbled over my words, still in shock that I was standing here. _

_She looked on me with curious eyes that took in my appearance without judgment or pity. She was just listening and gathering information in a way that suggested she cared. _

_Her charisma was magnetic._

_"My name's Rosalie." I remembered to tell her._

_Immediately her face went pale and her eyes began to glisten in wistfulness and memories. _

_"Rosalie?" She repeated the name as if it had meant something magical to her. _

_I nodded as I watched her change, opening the door a little wider so I could see she was wearing a beautiful green house day dress the color of a granny-smith apple, and her stomach was hugely round with an unborn child that was due any day now. _

_In a visceral reaction, my eyes started to burn with the threat of nervous, vulnerable tears. What would happen if she turned me away? What would happen if she didn't?_

_"It's been a while since I heard that name." Vera exhaled like something heavy had just been lifted off her chest and I wondered how Vivien knew this reaction was going to happen because as if this name had been some sort of password or magic key, Vera opened up for me. _

_"I just arrived from Tennessee. My family passed in a fire that destroyed my home, and the only family I knew of was a very distant cousin that lived here in Rochester, but it must've been outdated information because I can't find him anywhere… and no one seems to know where he's gone."_

_"Do you know his name?" Vera furrowed her brow._

_I remembered what Vivien told me to say._

_"Carlisle Cullen." I said, still not sure what it meant, but Vivien knew and Vivien said this information would protect me. "But, I've never met him."_

_Vera's eyes filled with distant recollection then faded as she pouted her bottom lip in thought._

_"I haven't heard anything about the Cullens in quite a bit, but they've since moved on." Vera sighed still thinking before her eyes focused on mine yet again. _

_She was exactly as Vivien had described her, but I wouldn't feel safe until I knew for sure…_

_"That's too bad." I sighed. "Someone in town mentioned you might have known them."_

_Vivien was very specific about the words I could use, and as much as I wanted to ask questions, I was more concerned with getting out of Tennessee and away from…_

_I swallowed, thankful Vera had begun to speak again before I'd gotten too lost in thought._

_Vivien and I had an unspoken 'need to know' agreement solely built upon my desperation and her mystery. _

_"Yes, Dr. Cullen was my little boy's doctor a few years ago." Vera nodded. "I didn't hear much about where he was headed when…"_

_She trailed off, realizing the unimportant details were unnecessary._

_"Please. Come in. Let me make you some tea, _Rosalie_." Vera gave me a soft smile that was full of memories, nostalgia, and connection to my new name that I didn't understand as she finally invited me in. _

_"I would like that very much." I returned her smile, my heart jumping up to my throat._

_As I stepped over the threshold, the overwhelming scent of baked bread and cinnamon flooded my senses and my stomach growled audibly._

_"You must be hungry after your travels!" Vera noted, her big eyes even wider with shock at the terrible sound of my stomach that I'd grown to ignore. _

_"Oh I'm… fine." I lied. _

_"I was just about to make lunch. Really." Vera was too kind for this world, and hospitality emanated from her pores._

_Her house was modest and cozy, but it was beautifully decorated and homey. I noticed that there were a few children's toys strewn in the living room floor, but I didn't see a child…_

_Vivien had said I should ask to be the nanny. _

_I remembered clearly._

_"If it's really no trouble." I smiled politely._

_"Oh, your accent." Vera grinned. "It's just darling. If you'll just sit at the table and talk to me while I make us some sandwiches…"_

_That's when a flash of raven black curly hair barreled into the room in a squealing fit of laughter._

_Vera knelt and awaited the toddler with open arms as she scooped a two-ish year old little boy up and covered him with kisses. He was radiating with light and full of vibrancy. _

_"Rosalie, this is my son, Henry." Vera grinned, absolutely beautiful with maternal energy. _

_I noticed I was smiling too, really smiling for the first time in a long time. _

_Then, I noticed the dimples on Henry's cheeks as he twisted away from his mother's smothering affection with an adorable squeal._

_I gasped, my breath catching in my throat, and my eyes getting glassy with the threat of tears. _

_"Is everything all right?" Vera asked, noticing my change._

_Her voice sounded like it was far away and under water but I nodded._

_"He… just reminds me of my brother" I breathed. _

_"Really?" Vera smiled, showering her little boy with more kisses before letting him run off and play._

_"Yeah." I answered in a breath. "He died recently."_

_"I'm sorry to hear that, Rosalie, really." Vera's sincerity made me shiver as I followed her into the kitchen. _

_"It's okay. People say he's in a better place." I mumbled._

_"Is that not what you say too?" Vera asked out of true care. _

_"I guess I would." I swallowed. "But… I still don't believe he's really dead."_

_They always said twins had this sort of cosmic connection that was beyond understanding…_

_Now, it was like the signal had been jammed._

_I furrowed my brow, feeling heavily weighted as my eyes started to burn with the threat of tears._

_"Listen… Vera, can I be honest with you?" I exhaled, sadness and despair creeping in after I'd long held it off. _

_It was like Emmett crawled into my head, then and jumped straight out of my mouth. _

_He couldn't tell a damn lie if his life depended on it, and that's exactly the sort of dire situation I was in right now._

_Vera nodded, looking up from the counter with curious eyes._

_"There was no fire. I ran… from an abusive family and a really… terrible situation. I got a one way ticket here wanting a better life and a new start." I admitted, and as I slightly moved the scarf off my neck, I noticed Vera's eyes lock onto the bruises that still throbbed there._

_I clenched my jaw, seeing her skin pale to the color of milk._

_"My brother's wife showed up yesterday out of the blue, and gave me all this money and this dress… She told me to run. She said that's what he would've wanted…" My voice broke and cracked with emotion. "For me to be safe. And, I really need somewhere to stay, at least until I get on my feet. Please. I can't go home. I can't. I can do anything you need around the house. I can cook and clean and… and I'm good with children. Really. I don't need any money. I just need…" _

_Panic set in and I felt my heart racing in my chest as I watched Vera process all this. _

_I wondered if the elaborate plan Vivien had orchestrated was now all for naut as I watched Vera frown._

_"Please." I breathed. "I don't have _anyone_ left."_

_Vera took a shaky breath, looking down at her child and giving him a big kiss. _

_"Yes, you do. You have us." She looked back up at me, a covenant in her eyes. "Please. Stay as long as you need."_

_"Oh Vera, thank you so much." I exhaled thinking I could just burst into joyful, relieved tears. _

_"You know… You remind me of someone too…" Vera mused, giving me a little smile. _

_"Really?" I asked. _

_"An old friend..." She said with ancient sadness, but now there was hope in her eyes that matched mine._

* * *

**Edward **\- _Detached_

I fumed, absolutely hell-raisingly angry now as Carlisle and I followed their scent. I think Carlisle followed me because he was concerned, not only for Emmett and Rosalie, but for me too. I think he was afraid of what I'd do alone because I was so _angry_ at her.

Why in God's name did Rosalie think it was a good idea to take him off somewhere, _alone_?

She couldn't control him.

And, he was powerless to her…

This was a _dangerous_ combination.

The further we followed, the angrier I got until finally, I realized what they were doing.

Rosalie was taking him _home_.

We were supposed to leave for Denali a few hours ago, but Emmett and Rosalie were missing. They'd been all but inseparable and intimately involved in conversation none of us could think of intruding on since Rosalie got home yesterday afternoon.

But now, when we were supposed to be moving on… They'd run back…

I don't think I'd ever run so hard in my life, and Carlisle and I were silent as we moved.

We both knew Rosalie was a creature of vengeance, but we still had very little information in the long term on Emmett.

I assumed Rosalie was projecting her own ideas of justice and was supporting an idea that Emmett could potentially find peace if he found his own revenge and tied up his own loose ends _if he kill his father_.

Somehow, I imagined that Rosalie had convinced him to do it. She was actually the devil on his shoulder when all this time he'd thought of her as his angel. He didn't need permission to give into his darkest impulses, but Rosalie was feeding them. For Christ's sake he was a newborn.

Rosalie was insanely irresponsible, and this could set off a murderous chain reaction. Maybe this wouldn't be enough for him…

Maybe it wouldn't ever end…

Maybe he'd realize he was addicted to the high of killing…

Maybe he wasn't like her and he couldn't just turn it off...

We'd _all _be responsible for the destruction in his wake…

Then, the Volturi would get involved…

I didn't let Carlisle into these musings I was having because he'd be _heartbroken_, and I didn't know for sure yet, but the closer we got and the more rural our scenery began to be, I realized I was right and it terrified me.

_God, Rosalie…_

Carlisle and I were smart though and in Carlisle's long experience on tracking and Emmett and Rosalie's general carelessness around each other, we found a way to cut them off on a winding dirt path within the hour.

At the initial threat of our unannounced presence, Emmett predatorily growled at us, and Rosalie protectively put her hand on his arm as if she could've held him back.

He didn't snap at her, and was oddly re-centered at the tangible contact. Her hand on his arm tethered him to the reality that he wasn't just some mindless newborn, but she quickly dropped it back to her side.

Rosalie's eyes were wide as she met mine, but she wasn't guilty as I glared at her accusingly.

"Rosalie, this is _ridiculous_." I hissed at her.

She narrowed her eyes, thinking only in distance. She assumed I didn't approve because I just didn't understand.

"Then why did you follow?"

"Rosalie. You and Emmett need to come home." Carlisle extended both of his palms upward and to them, inviting them back like prodigal children. "We came for _you_. We want you home, and we want you to be a part of our family. You _know_ the sacrifices we have to make in this life in order for us to live like we do…"

Carlisle did have an idea on what they'd come here to do. He recognized that look in Emmett's eyes. It was in Rosalie's just a short while ago.

Emmett and Rosalie had only been gone a few hours, maybe only getting around a ten minute start on Carlisle and I before we found out they were truly missing. However, they'd still left home and it still broke Esme and Carlisle's hearts - infiltrating into Carlisle's thoughts as a sadness he wouldn't recover from.

Carlisle would ultimately forgive them because that's who he is, but he and Esme would _forever_ know that Emmett and Rosalie ran off without saying goodbye.

For Rosalie, this was the second time she'd made it obvious there was a detachment. Esme and Carlisle took it as a sign that no matter what, Rosalie would always feel disconnected from what they tried to make a family unit. They felt like this was Rosalie's way of telling them it wasn't enough for her - their unconditional love, their acceptance, Carlisle's mercy... It all still wasn't enough.

There'd always be a mistrust of Rosalie after today, and maybe she didn't deserve it because she wasn't thinking clearly right now…

Neither of them were.

Emmett was _beyond_ himself at the moment. He was just a newborn, thirsty not just for blood, but for death and destruction. He was incoherent in the face of revenge and the thought of killing.

He was a slave to his anger…

Rosalie knew all too well what this was like though she was far too vain to admit it.

"Come home…" Carlisle slowly reached out his hands for them again, benevolently _hoping_. "Please."

But at the mention of _home_, Emmett's eyes darted away from Carlisle toward where I saw in his thoughts that his human house was.

He was still attached in a way none of us were.

He ached. He was left wanting…

Everyone else had gotten their 'answers' or their closure.

Emmett hadn't.

I noticed his pain is something he misinterpreted as rage and he directed it all into his mission.

Emmett was still hellbent on going to kill his father, and we were just a football field's length away.

He had just wanted to be able to do it without hurting his other family…

That's where Rosalie would come in…

I saw their plan clearly, but then I realized it wouldn't matter.

The house was quiet… Too quiet.

There weren't even dreaming thoughts in the dead of night…

_The house is empty_. Carlisle thought at me, retreating from his previous mission to remind Emmett and Rosalie of who we were and what we stood for.

Emmett's house was truly _empty_. Surely, his senses revealed that to him.

Rosalie realized the same thing we did and looked over at me, her thoughts confused.

It had just been yesterday the house had seemed full to her…

I realized Emmett's peripheral senses registered the memories around him on this land he called home for so long…

It seemed so foreign to him now.

His memory was fuzzy, but I saw laughter and playing and people and_ life_.

But, he was focused on that door, clear and crisp in front of him…

"Emmett, I don't think anyone's home." I countered his thoughts.

"No." He said this not arguing with me. He was agreeing with me, but he was in a trance as he confidently walked straight for the front door he'd walked through thousands of times.

Emmett realized something was wrong too, as if he'd been denying it.

Then, my own senses revealed…

There was blood… But, it wasn't hot and wet and…

_Edward? _Carlisle questioned as we followed Emmett.

I didn't hear _anything_ from inside. None of us did.

_What is he walking into?_ Rosalie asked me, shocking me with just how protective of him she mentally sounded in this moment.

I just furrowed my brow, shaking my head.

I didn't know.

There were no thoughts.

Rosalie eyes were full of questions and apprehension as she looked from Emmett's back and over to me before she followed close behind him.

He was going to find an empty house…

By now, he knew that.

In an odd way, this was the best case scenario. This meant that we wouldn't be found out. It meant he wouldn't kill anyone. It meant that at least for today, revenge and violence would not be a cycle.

It meant his family _got out_.

Emmett could revisit his childhood home and reminisce, then we could be on our way.

Then, Emmett opened the front door and we never could've imagined in a thousand years what we'd be greeted with.

The house wasn't empty.

In the split human second that Emmett's eyes registered the black pair of boots floating six inches off the ground, Rosalie had already taken a sharp inhale and looked over at Emmett in deep concern.

Her hand had flown to her mouth in a gasp, unable to believe what we were seeing.

Even after the atrocities we'd borne witness to in this life, this was probably one of the most unimaginable things I'd ever come across.

"Emmett…" Rosalie softly spoke his name.

Emmett's eyes traveled upward, finally settling on the makeshift noose his father was hanging from.

Carlisle's thoughts revealed that medically, he couldn't have been dead for more than a couple of hours…

But, Emmett's thoughts went far and away from the present.

_Cacophonous sounds banged through the air as it woke Emmett from an exhausted slumber in the corner cot at the other side of the room._

_'Emmett!' His father's voice called from the front door, urgency in his tone._

_Emmett was young, no more than twelve or so, as he sat up and rubbed his eyes._

_'I'm coming.' Emmett's voice cracked, and he stood up on the knobby knees of an awkward preteen._

_Emmett's father caught himself on a side table before Emmett got to him. _

_'I got it. I got it.' Emmett's father mumbled, but he grinned at the sight of Emmett, reaching to pat the top of his head like Emmett was a little child._

_'You've gotten taller.' His father hiccuped almost unintelligibly, sliding to the floor in a drunken stupor._

_'Not since this morning.' Emmett chuckled humorlessly as he ducked to put his father's arm around his shoulders so he could help him back up to his feet. 'Come on. You need to get to bed.'_

_'No. No, just come on down here and sit with your old man.' He shrugged away and beckoned to the spot next to him._

_It was presently right under the space he was hanging now…_

_Emmett apprehensively took the spot next to him sitting with his arms around his knees and his eyes purposefully away from his father's. _

_'You're such a good kid. You know that?' His father told him, brushing his knuckles over Emmett's face. _

_Emmett didn't flinch when he raised his hand to him, but I could see how hard it had been not to. He'd never had his father's hand on him when it wasn't packing a punch._

_'Yeah. I do.' Emmett gave a little mischievous half-smile. 'Yes _sir_.'_

_He corrected himself, no humor in his eyes now._

_'Come 'ere' He pulled on Emmett's arm, but Emmett stiffened, fighting him in his reluctance thinking he'd responded wrong and was about to be punished._

_He knew how important it was to call him sir. He'd slipped._

_'I said. Come. Here.' His father requested angrily through his teeth, but something was breaking in him._

_Desperation was evident in his eyes that perfectly mirrored his son's, and so it was easy to see his anger was a mask for something else._

_Pain._

_Emmett just nodded, complying in apprehensive awkwardness as his father pulled him into his arms._

_His father inhaled deeply, ducking his head to sob into Emmett's unruly black hair. Emmett stiffened in his father's strange embrace, not knowing what to think or feel as he heard his father start to cry._

_In Emmett's mind, at twelve he was fully grown, and right now his father was treating him like he was a baby._

_'Sir?…' Emmett was on edge, knowing his father was drunk, but never having seen him quite like this. _

_He addressed his father formally and removedly, but his father clutched to him like a life line, so close it took the breath straight out of his chest. _

_'Just a kid…' His father finally spoke a nonsensical, drunken sentence holding Emmett so close it was like he could've absorbed him. _

_Emmett could barely breathe, but he didn't dare move. _

_His father mumbled nonsense after nonsense until he shot to sit up and he grabbed Emmett's face in his hand in violent urgency, looking straight into the mirror of his eyes as he cursed and cried._

_'You goddamned son of a bitch.' His father's words slurred, and his grip on Emmett's face turned into something differently desperate. _

_It was still violent, but it was… _afraid_. _

_Emmett was still as stone, not intimidated by him in the slightest, mostly just confused. _

_'Your age… I was… War…' _

_'I'm just twelve.' Emmett corrected him. _

_'A kid.' His father frowned, not really hearing his son's response. 'Just a kid…'_

_Emmett's eyes were wide just staring as his father gruffly held onto him calling him names that didn't seem to really be directed at him. Emmett knew that by now. It was becoming nonsense that his father spewed, just blind anger and drunkenness. _

_His father mumbled more unintelligible words, spitting in Emmett's face before he finally wrapped his arms around him again pressing his hands into his back as he cried heartbreakingly._

_I now heard a woken baby crying in discord, and I noticed Emmett's mother standing at the threshold now, looking on in haunted horror as she bounced the disturbed baby on her hip._

_Emmett's other sisters didn't even bother coming in the room though they had to have been awake. They were afraid to look. _

_Emmett was the one holding his father in his arms now, soothing him like a child. He shook his head when he made eye contact with his mother, communicating the need to leave them alone. His mother took the crying baby back behind the corner silently. _

_'Shhh…' Emmett encouraged, letting his father wallow in his arms, crying like I'd never heard someone cry._

_'Lost… Come home…' Emmett's father was talking nonsensically as he sobbed into his son. 'Home…'_

_'Shhh… You're home.' Emmett whispered still trying to convince him, as he cried into Emmett's shoulder. "You're home."_

_—_

"I have to bury him." Emmett immediately processed and coped by realizing there was something he could do and control.

I tried not to look too in the know on his reverie, but I saw that this was the memory he always visited to forgive his father for _everything_. He justified and forgave based on this one moment in time that I assumed was only once in his lifetime.

Selfishly, I shivered at the look of his father's eyes in that memory. One day they'd call it PTSD and Emmett would briefly think about his father…

I thought about my own desire to enlist in that war… I had been too young, but I imagined how my life had been different if I had been born just a year or two earlier, being the same age as Emmett's father and getting shipped off to that so called _Great_ War. There was nothing great about it, but it was such a noble notion to enlist - to be a soldier and serve the country. I'd been hypnotized by it, by the romanticism…

I realized then as I looked at Emmett standing under his father's strangled corpse in his childhood home that time had passed and Emmett and Rosalie were from a different generation than me. I might've had children a little younger than them by this point, but I was still seventeen. I looked seventeen and my body was frozen at seventeen, but for the first time as I looked at Emmett's face - he looked like a child and I felt like the thirty five year old man I was inside.

Emmett was a kid… He was just a kid.

I wondered if this is how Carlisle felt as he watched generation after generation move on around him…

"Edward and Carlisle can…" Rosalie suggested to Emmett softly like she was talking to a fragile toddler.

"No." Emmett cut her off strongly, not even looking her way as he started to pull his father's corpse down from where it hung. "I can do it."

Emmett worked like he was cleaning up a mess he was embarrassed for us to see as his father lie flat on the floor now and Emmett crossed his arms over his chest.

"Carlisle…." Rosalie requested in a whisper with wide, concerned eyes.

She assumed Emmett wasn't thinking clearly, but she would've been wrong. After a momentary lapse, his mind had become crystal clear like a glassy lake. I saw straight down to his depths.

He thought incredibly practical things as he considered his father's burial. There was no coffin. Did he remember all the words you were supposed to say on his own without his mother reminding him? Surely he'd been to enough funerals in the past few years. But his father was a soldier. He had a special funeral right?

But… he didn't know he was lying to himself in his thoughts. He was in denial.

"My sisters are buried just a little west of the barn." Emmett's voice was unweighted and easy like he was talking about the weather.

Carlisle and Rosalie exchanged a look, both incredibly worried about him inwardly spiraling.

Carlisle thought it would be best if someone would find his body, hung as it had been before our interference, but there was no way Carlisle could find to talk to Emmett about this.

"Let _me_ help you, Emmett." Rosalie offered, her voice soft and testing as she reached for his hand as he worked.

Emmett froze and looked toward her.

"I've. got. it. Really." He said, slowly for her to understand his sincerity - then his eyes caught the piano in the corner over her shoulder.

The piano's keys and frame were beaten into oblivion with a blunt object, and splinters littered the floor.

This was his mother's prized possession. In many ways, this was a tangible manifestation of her.

To Emmett, and even to Rosalie who'd only met her once, this piano _was_… _her_.

He took a swift inhale, his eyes getting impossibly darker.

"It's okay." Rosalie didn't even have to look over her shoulder to know what he was looking at.

Her heart had already shattered over it too.

Emmett nodded, mostly expressionless.

His thoughts went chaotic and his eyes took in all the devastating details of the destruction.

"I'm fine." He answered a question she hadn't asked and a doubt began to creep into his mind that told him maybe… _he wasn't_.

Emmett moved abruptly then and walked through the rest of the tiny house, looking for the rest of them but obviously knowing in his conscious mind that he wouldn't find them.

He wanted to be sure.

As he left the room, Carlisle knelt by Emmett's father whispering something silent and private into his dead ear that I didn't hear because Rosalie mentally spoke over him.

_Edward? _Rosalie's thoughts were loud though she spoke more softly than I'd ever heard her speak to compensate.

_I don't know what to do. _She thought.

Rosalie felt guilty, wildly guilty and she tried desperately to avoid acknowledging the death in the room.

Carlisle opted to fray the top of the rope quickly to look like it had naturally fallen from decay. He'd tell Emmett when he returned and try to talk him into this rational closure. It was his family home, his land. He could still be laid to rest here, like this…

I still kept my eyes down, but my eyes shot up to Rosalie as I heard her own sidebar mental conversation.

She blamed herself. I thought about what Esme had said earlier that Rosalie placed blame every where else because it was easier, but now, in this moment she blamed herself.

I didn't know what to say.

Emmett was finding no trace of them either. I noticed how different things looked to him now here even though it was his home. Ruthie had taken her favorite doll that had been Dorothy's so many years before. The trunk his mother had brought here from Alabama was gone. Annie May's boots weren't in the corner.

Emmett knew they'd left then, but he couldn't bring himself to feel any relief yet.

"Emmett!" Carlisle called in a panic.

In all the chaos, Rosalie, Carlisle, and I hadn't acknowledged the smell of approaching humans. But, Emmett just had.

There was only one way out of the house, and we were standing in front of the door, but as desperate as Emmett would be for blood, he wouldn't be that stupid to try and face us head on.

In less than a millisecond, Carlisle reacted, and knew before he did it that he'd go out the window and we had to cut him off.

Rosalie, Carlisle, and I threw open the door and ran out into the impossibly dark night after him.

There were seven ghosts with a dim lantern coming just up the hill passing the barn a little west of here. They seemed to float menacingly, and I was disgusted by their thoughts for the brief moment they still remained.

I realized Rosalie didn't want to catch Emmett. Her thoughts were obvious.

She wanted them dead.

Carlisle was closest though and would've been able to grab Emmett to stop him and save those seven human lives. However…

_Carlisle hesitated_.

It was barely for less than a human second, but Carlisle _hesitated_, knowing what these white robes were and what hate they represented. This was directly against everything Carlisle stood for, but so was allowing them to be murdered in Emmett's blood lust. It was a complicated moral philosophy dilemma that he had to solve and act on in the blink of an eye - or less.

It wouldn't appear that way outwardly, but he did let Emmett go.

For the rest of eternity Carlisle would hold this dark secret, and I would hold it for him too.

This would be something we'd share privately that would contribute immensely to the depth of our relationship and his special connection to me beyond just being his first transformation.

In an of itself, I saw that it really was a moment of humanity in a centuries old vampire…

Because of Carlisle's hesitation, Emmett cut those men's atrocious thoughts off, but instead of immediately feeding, he did something especially surprising given his newborn instincts.

It was so unfathomably gruesome that those men's next thoughts would haunt me as some of the most hellish thoughts I'd ever hear in my existence.

Impossibly, Emmett's human emotion of rage was even more wild than his vampiric blood lust as he violently dismembered all seven of them like he was just easily pulling meat off of a bone. To him he was their butcher and, that's how easy this was to him. Before they could even scream, their tongues had been ripped out or they were gurgling on their own blood.

There was no more white.

There was only red, bright red.

My throat burned intensely, but I was… I was afraid.

Emmett was wild, like I'd never seen anyone or anything wild before. His eyes were impossibly chaotic but focused with hate and rage like I couldn't have ever imagined.

I'd never seen a newborn vampire allowed to act freely and it was scarier than anything I could've ever imagined. Rosalie, Esme, and I had Carlisle as our conscious, but Emmett…

Emmett's instincts were beyond control. Even his human ones.

While I had been learning how to play piano and all about Victorian manners, Emmett had grown up wild like an animal and being a vampire only enhanced this.

He growled torturously. He wished it would've been more difficult to kill them. He wished he could feel their struggle. He wished his muscles would've strained in effort, but it was all too easy.

Even stopping to give in to bloodlust and indulge in everything his torturous imagination could cook up, Emmett's massacre took all of forty-five seconds. I knew those forty-five seconds would haunt him forever though – and for us forever was an awfully long time.

Carlisle looked away in utter heartbreak, and I grimaced.

Rosalie watched Emmett's display of unthinkable violence without flinching. She observed him descend into the role of the demon that she'd damned him to be.

Blood ran down his chin and stained his hands until they were covered and dripping. He dropped the detached spine he held in his hand, when he finally registered one of their mangled faces, on a decapitated skull.

Emmett recognized him.

A Protestant preacher from town - that had violently raped his sister and killed Emmett's best friend.

I realized in Rosalie's thoughts that's why they were here again. They were coming for Dorothy. Emmett didn't know they'd come back in his absence, and this wasn't the first time.

A complex story unfolded I couldn't truly follow in both of their wild thoughts, but I understood enough to know if Carlisle hadn't hesitated and I knew what I knew now, I would've even fought Carlisle to make sure Emmett got to kill all those men.

The number of men lying dismembered in the grass was personally significant to Rosalie and she looked on this scene with tragic familiarity before she zeroed in on Emmett.

Rosalie brought him here not just to kill his father, but to kill _them_. She thought it would bring him closure. She thought it would bring _her_ closure. She thought it would be justice for Dorothy and protective of any other girl that could've fallen victim to these special kinds of monsters.

But I saw in her thoughts now that her own vengeance hadn't brought her any solace.

She still felt empty, and now…

Emmett looked down at his bright red hands, taking a sharp gasping inhale as he realized…

All of that still wasn't enough for him.


	11. Seven Devils (Part II)

_**Seven Devils**_

_Holy water cannot help you now_

_Thousand armies couldn't keep me out_

_I don't want your money_

_I don't want your crown_

_See I've come to burn your kingdom down_

_They can keep me out_

_'Til I tear the walls_

_'Til I save your heart_

_And to take your soul_

_For what has been done_

_Cannot be undone_

_In the evil's heart_

_In the evil's soul_

_Seven devils all around you_

* * *

**Rosalie: **_I don't know_

I prayed to a God I doubted could bear to look upon my face after what I'd become and what I'd made of His good, honest, and kind Emmett McCarty…

I watched him descend…

Emmett's jaw clenched and his eyes were shaded in darkness, intense and chilling. He looked like the monster I'd made him into.

The litter of dismembered body parts around him was like a grotesque garden in the blood stained grass.

However… Even though I'd been a spectator to his violent performance, he looked wildly out of place amongst the severed heads, displaced arms and legs, broken bones, and lake of blood.

He looked… like a _child._

He didn't belong there, amidst something as awful as this. He was _good_.

And, he still _believed_ good things could happen. He still had a spark of optimism and... and _hope_ in him…

He had the naivety to think that there was more than this.

These two years of immortality had made me cynical and vile. I knew that to be true. As I watched him pull apart men as easily as breaking bread, I knew that even though I'd never indulged in human blood, Emmett had never indulged in the darkness that I reveled in.

I didn't believe. I didn't have hope.

I knew there was no more than this…

Emmett completed one of the most grotesque acts of horror that I'd ever witnessed, (aside from the one I myself committed to Royce and his friends) but still I realized he was the best person I'd ever known.

Emmett was a _good man_ through and through and I wanted to be better.

My only experience with a man had left my soul destroyed – and I wished so desperately that I could return to the girl I was before because that's the girl that was worthy of a man like Emmett McCarty.

He was _defiant_ in the face of darkness, even in the midst of his massacre.

Emmett McCarty was thoroughly_ good_, down to his core. He was good and even_ I_ couldn't ruin him. In his violence, he was just as beautifully graceful as he was savagely animalistic.

As I watched him expertly rip apart the human body, I thought about his hands on me today.

Now looking back, I wondered if there was something seriously psychologically wrong with me that in all that violence, I was uncannily calm, just imagining the way it felt to have his arms around me today as we talked.

He handled me like porcelain - fragile, valuable, precious…

Watching him kill those men, I saw what he was capable of, but… but just as violent as he treated them, he treated me as carefully.

That's when I knew I had begun to care for him in a way that was dangerous and foreboding…

Emmett's eyes were tortured and sorrow-filled and triumphant and bloodthirsty all at once after he completed this slaughter.

Then, he looked to _me_ for approval.

Even as a newborn vampire, I had never felt this out of control.

"Emmett, it's all right." Edward began, obviously responding to the wild thoughts in Emmett's mind.

Emmett's eyes darted over my face, searching.

Emmett seemed to panic, obviously needing something from my gaze that I couldn't provide.

I couldn't look away.

"Emmett," I finally whispered his name, as he exhaled like he'd just been ridded of a heavy weight.

"It just… I couldn't stop…" His voice rose desperately.

I think he assumed I was disappointed in him.

I wasn't.

In fact… I think I was exactly the opposite.

"Emmett, _son_… This isn't who you are. You can move on." Carlisle's voice was tight in his chest and I noticed Edward looked over at him with deep concern and compassion. "You are not what you've done. You can move on."

It felt like _I'd_ robbed Emmett of his innocence, stripped him of his goodness and pure heart. It wasn't what he'd done. It was because of _me_.

Emmett frowned, still looking down at his dripping red hands as he didn't respond to Carlisle.

My throat burned in a smolder, but it was nothing compared to my heart.

"I didn't want you to see that, Rose." Emmett mumbled, his eyes transforming into something heart wrenching as he looked back to speak to me and only me.

I tentatively approached him.

"It's all right." I said as evenly as I could, taking slow steps.

I felt Edward and Carlisle's eyes heavy on us.

The closer I got to him the more my stomach fluttered with nervousness.

"It happened so _fast_…" He whispered and I tried not to respond to his panic.

I didn't see any remorse in his face - just _shock_.

Edward looked over at me. I was right.

Emmett didn't have any remorse.

Nor should he.

Edward narrowed his eyes then. That was exactly the kind of thinking that had him separated from Carlisle and Esme for the last decade…

It scared me now that Emmett could do the same.

It scared me that he could leave me…

In pursuit of justice…

He'd just killed seven of them.

There were tens of thousands of those hate filled people… That were _known_.

It'd never end.

"It's over now." I told him with a nod, close enough to touch him now though of course I didn't dare.

Carlisle and Edward stood back a little from us, still watching Emmett carefully. They thought he could snap any second.

He was blood drunk. I could see it in his eyes.

I was shockingly _calm_ considering.

"You need to get cleaned up." I told him plainly. "We're leaving for Alaska now."

Emmett nodded, taking my directions.

"Do you want to say goodbye to your father?" I asked him.

"He needs to be found. Burying him would raise too many questions." Edward said as tenderly as he could. "But, we can go with you to say a few words if you need."

"No, it's fine." Emmett registered Edward's voice, but he didn't connect his eyes. "That'll be just fine. It has to do."

He rearranged his words like it was necessary. I wondered if it was true. Regardless of what a monster I'd thought his father was, he was still Emmett's father and I wondered if that still mattered to him.

"And, we need to burn these people before sunrise, Emmett." Edward said easily. "So they _aren't_ found."

Emmett's eyes immediately went wild again and I worried.

"If you could still call them people…" He mumbled, looking around with white hot rage still burning in his vermillion irises.

"You go get cleaned up. We'll take care of this." Carlisle spoke evenly.

He would forgive Emmett for this. It'd just take some time.

Emmett nodded, still not fully processing as he turned his back.

The three of us exchanged a look on who would keep watch on Emmett and I had been voted the one to do it. I think I'd hoped as much.

"Be careful." Carlisle mouthed to me but I pretended I hadn't seen him.

It was obvious Carlisle didn't trust me especially not after my betrayal today, but that he and Edward were too gentlemanly to make me clean up this mess.

I followed Emmett slowly as it finally sank in all that had transpired in such a short amount of time.

Now, I was rightfully fearful.

I was about to be alone with Emmett. Totally. Alone.

It seemed different before I'd been all but assaulted with the realization that I could be… falling in love with him.

I paused on the outskirts of some trees and took a deep breath. Their blood was still in the air and it torturously burnt my throat, but Emmett's own scent centered me intertwined with it all. I clenched my jaw before I followed to the opening in the trees where a little dirty stream was babbling in the silent night air.

As he shrugged out of his shirt, I thought for sure my dead heart skipped a beat.

I'd never seen a man so… _undressed_ before. Well, technically.

I recalled the way his human skin had been tattered and torn, ripped into by that bear.

Now, there were no interruptions to the planes of his back.

I knew I would've blushed if I could have as his vampiric white skin seemed to radiate under the moon light and I saw the definition of his back muscles around his shoulders while he knelt by the edge of the water, dipping his stained hands in so that a swirl of red expanded like a cloud around him.

It terrified me, but I was drawn to the temptation of his presence and undivided attention.

Somehow, after all that brutality, I think I trusted him even more.

How, I don't know. But, I think it had to do with something that he would _never_ blindside me. I would know him. He wouldn't betray me.

He'd act as I expected him to.

He would be honest with me about his every fault and his every victory.

He would show me all, concealing nothing...

He splashed water over his face in an attempt to wash himself clean literally and metaphorically of the past few hours.

I took a deep breath.

"I'm sorry." He lied, not looking back at me to acknowledge my presence.

There wasn't anything that I could say.

Except there was… I should've apologized to him.

I did this to him.

_I_ was the monster.

I watched him for a long moment, but he didn't turn his back.

He stared down into the water, still waiting for my response as he fixated on the reflection of his own red eyes.

"You aren't." I breathed. "You aren't sorry."

Then I realized, I wasn't either.

I wasn't sorry I'd had Carlisle change him, no matter how much I hated this life. I wasn't sorry I'd brought him back here. I wasn't sorry those people were dead.

I wasn't sorry about any of it.

Emmett shook his head, but he still didn't look back at me.

"I'm not." He corrected himself, agreeing with me. "Not in the slightest."

I got a stroke of bravery then at his honesty and I took a little step forward like a skittish little deer.

He shrugged his arms back into his shirt but he didn't button it as he sighed and sat back, propping up on his hands as he stared at the moon.

"And, you don't have to be. Not to me." I told him softly.

He turned at this, his bright red eyes finding mine as he opened his right shoulder to beckon me to sit down next to him.

I was nervous and my stomach was turning violent flips, especially at the glimpse of the muscles of his torso still exposed as he neglected to button his shirt up.

He was in the presence of a lady. Didn't he know any better? I was nervously rambling in my own thoughts before I focused and ever so slowly descended to sit down next to him in the grass.

I didn't dare speak in fear I would trip all over my words.

I remained on edge and sitting oddly upright and stiff in contrast to his relaxed position.

His eyes followed me and though he never thought twice before he spoke, right now he seemed to be calculating what he was going to say next.

It made me nervous.

"Rosalie…" He exhaled, running his hands through his hair sighing exasperatedly.

"You're the only person I wish I was really sorry for." Emmett seemed frustrated with himself.

"But, you're right. I'm not sorry. I _enjoyed_ killing all those people. I honestly… _enjoyed_ it. I'd do it again if I could." He snorted humorlessly.

"It's okay." I said softly.

"No. It's not. Your face. The way you're looking at me right now." He scrambled, but grossly misidentified the look on my face. "You see me differently now. I know it."

I did, but he didn't know exactly how and it wasn't necessarily bad…

For him.

For me, it felt like a great tragedy…

I cared about Emmett in a way that was becoming more and more dangerous with every passing moment.

I curled my knees to my chest, crossing my arms and resting my elbows on my knees. I was close enough to lean and put my head on Emmett's shoulder.

Of course I didn't.

His brilliant red eyes focused on me though, and I prepared myself to tell him something I hadn't wanted him to ever know about me.

I pursed my lips.

"I understand why you did it." I breathed. "I… I've never tasted human blood but…. I've killed before, so I understand." I admitted to him nervously.

If I had a working heart, it'd be racing.

Emmett didn't respond, but I knew he was listening to me because his eyes darted over my face.

"I killed seven people, a few months ago. And, it wasn't even for bloodlust or sustenance. It was strictly for my own delight. It was meticulously planned and expertly calculated." I started, my voice uneasy as I pushed through the words. "I spent two years indulging in the fantasy of their deaths and then I carried through with it. It was a theatrical production that I had designed down to the detail."

He looked over my face urgently, his brow furrowing in his desperate search for something.

"I chose all that… _consciously_. You didn't." I noticed I was trying to make him feel better.

I bit my lip, frowning as I realized that I was even choosing to darken his image of me to comfort him.

"Why'd you do it then?" He asked the question I didn't want to answer.

He mirrored my sitting position, bringing his knees up too and crossing his arms over his legs. His eyes weren't heavy, but they were on me, _listening_.

My mother had scolded me for sitting improperly thousands of times as a girl and I imagined she'd have something to say about my manners now.

But, it didn't matter any more.

Ever so slowly, I laid my head on Emmett's shoulder in a tender, shockingly intimate gesture. His muscles were still tensed to the point of stone, not relaxing to my touch like I'd been a butterfly landing on him and any sudden movement could scare me off.

A few moments later, he exhaled though, and I finally responded on the edge of his breath.

"Revenge."

Emmett didn't press me for any more information. I felt him nod, registering what I'd said, but I couldn't tell how he was truly responding. I didn't know what he was feeling or thinking, but I chose to put my head on his shoulder partially because I couldn't handle the pressure of his endlessly deep red eyes anymore.

Damn it.

"The people that killed you." He clarified but he didn't need to.

I didn't respond because I didn't have to.

"Immediately after, I called Carlisle and told him everything, every explicit detail." I said softly. "And, he forgave me… He dismissed what I did as justice."

I shifted closer to him as perfectly clear memories flooded my mind of those nights…

"Carlisle's a fool." I admitted, feeling like I was betraying him all over again.

This caused Emmett's head to turn.

"Why do you say that?" Emmett didn't need to ask, but he did out of support for my need for a break in the conversation with his prompted response.

"He thought… Well, he still _believes_ that what I did to them was a fair trade for what they'd done to me. Esme and Edward too… They all think it was evenhanded."

I sneered, but he couldn't see my face.

"But it wasn't." Emmett understood me perfectly regardless of specifics, and I gave into temptation and sat back to look at him.

His eyes held _knowing_ in them beyond what words could communicate and I exhaled as I finally shook my head. I was more honest with him in this moment than I'd ever been with anyone - including myself.

"Even as painful and horrible and gruesome that it was - what I did to them, it was still not enough for it to be called justice for what they did to me." I breathed, feeling vulnerable.

I couldn't look at him now, but he tilted my chin up with his fingertips so I'd find his eyes. My gaze was shameful, and again I turned away slightly so I wouldn't have to see his reaction to what I was about to say.

"It wasn't… It wasn't enough for me." I almost choked out the words.

"I'm sorry." Emmett said with the utmost authenticity, more authentically than anyone in my 'family' had ever spoken of my loss – even Esme as a fellow woman.

We didn't say anything for a long moment as we sat next to one another by the stream. I laid my head back on his shoulder, and I was close to him in a way I had never been close to anyone - beyond physicality.

He shifted to put his arm around me as I kept my head on his shoulder, and though I most definitely felt the weight of him on my skin, for the first time physical contact wasn't _heavy_.

His fingers traced an indistinct pattern on my opposite shoulder and though we definitely didn't need to respirate, it was comforting to synchronize my breath pattern with his - slow and deep.

"I know it's different, but all that was not enough for me either." He finally spoke after a long moment.

"I understand what you mean." I nodded, and I meant it.

"You do. Which is why you'll also understand what else I'm about to say." Emmett inhaled deeply.

"Dorothy didn't tell me. Not like she told you." Emmett sounded like he was in physical pain talking about this, and it made my limbs feel heavy. "But… I knew."

My instinct was to get closer to him, and so I did.

"She's strong." I said all I knew to say, my voice shaking because I was realizing again that I wasn't…

"She is." Emmett agreed, his voice rumbling in his chest full of emotion like I'd never heard in him before. "But, I never wanted her to _have_ to be."

I felt something flutter in my stomach, and I didn't dare look up to find his eyes because I was afraid of what I'd do…

"You know, one thing my father taught me was that it was important to always be the strongest guy in every room. Knock people out or get knocked out yourself you know?…" Emmett shifted conversation tangentially.

I did know though.

From what I'd observed and from what Emmett inadvertently told me, I couldn't imagine his father teaching Emmett this on purpose man to man, just as a lesson learned from flying fists throughout his upbringing that made him _have_ to learn this.

Emmett still hadn't remotely mentioned violence or abuse in his house and I wondered if he thought it was… _normal_. I certainly feared so, and it scared me even more that physical violence was something so common in his personal life at that fight club too. Everything about his life was tragically _physical. _

"And, one day I realized he was right, I _was_ the strongest, so no one'd dare touch me. No one'd touch my sisters. No one'd mess with any of my friends when I was around. A few years back, I finally stood a head taller and packed a harder punch than my Pa so even _he_ lightened up." Emmett went on finally acknowledging to me what I'd already assumed.

"I thought that was_ it_." Emmett said, maintaining an unemotional distance from his point up until now, but I began to hear what I imagined was anger in his voice and it sent a chill down my spine.

"I thought that was all it took to protect everyone I ever cared about, but then… everybody started _dying_. And it didn't matter how strong I was then. Just like it didn't matter how strong I was when they… they killed my best pal Sam and… did… _that_… to Dorothy. It didn't _matter_." Emmett kept his voice even expertly, but he stumbled over the words at the end because he was tripping over his blinding rage.

It scared me.

"But, tonight…Tonight, those people were _no_ match for me like this…" Emmett said with a dark gleam in his eye. "No one is. Not even Carlisle or the know-it-all. And… And I think I needed it to be harder to kill those bastards. I wanted to feel them struggle. I wanted them to put up a fight. I didn't want to be _so_ much stronger I couldn't feel when it hurt…" Emmett admitted.

"I only wish I'd been able to wait long enough to hear them beg for their lousy, pathetic, lives…"

The hand that had just pulled out someone's spine up through their throat traced over my arm like I was as fragile as porcelain.

I shivered.

His delicacy with me was in great contrast to his earlier violence and it made butterflies soar in my stomach again.

"I wish it would've been harder to rip them into pieces. I wish they could've felt more pain for longer." He listed.

I thought about how expertly I'd trained so I could draw my killers' deaths out and not spill a drop of their blood. I thought about how I tortured them in unspeakable ways - how I'd heard them cry and beg for mercy…

I remembered the look on Royce's face when he saw me… I remembered how good it felt to have him begging _me _to stop…

How powerful _I_ felt…

I shivered involuntarily and Emmett's fingers stopped in their tracks on my skin.

"Oh God, I'm sorry. I don't mean to be too… _harsh_." He apologized for his honesty, but little did he know what a monster I was and the atrocity I had been visiting in my own mind.

I was a highly skilled killer - the most proficient of assassins… I found temporary enjoyment in lording my strength over them. Now, I was so much stronger than them. They couldn't fight against me any more than I could have fought them in my human life.

It was a momentary advantage over them, but now… Now they were dead and, I was left with memory and pain of what they'd done in my human life as a now permanent impact on my monotonous immortal life.

It had only been two years and what were two years in the span of eternity?…

I would be burdened with the memory for _eternity_…

Emmett misunderstood my intent by saying my revenge wasn't enough. It wasn't about anything I did or _didn't_ do to them. I imagined and executed explicit horror that couldn't be fathomed - even by Emmett. Their deaths couldn't have been more perfectly atrocious. I did exactly what I'd planned to do and if I could kill them all over again, I'd do it exactly the same.

But, it wasn't enough because…

It didn't bring me back to life.

It didn't turn back the clock.

It didn't erase their claims on my body.

It didn't give me back my dignity, my virtue, my feminine experience of beauty…

It didn't make me forget their hands on me... their…

I would never be the same person ever again.

I was theatrical and melodramatic, but none of it - not those perfectly orchestrated murders, not watching Emmett kill bad people in his vigilante justice, not confiding in his sister, not giving her my name and my life in a sad, selfish attempt at resurrection- none of it would ever make me into the Rosalie Hale that I'd once been.

I didn't recognize myself. In any of it. I wasn't there. I wasn't here.

Did I even exist any more?

_No matter how long I stared at myself in the mirror, I'd never see anyone I recognized for as long as I walked this earth. _

_They'd taken my identity. _

_I'd been erased._

_Forever._

"Rosalie… I'm sorry." Emmett sat back, looking at me with wide, concerned eyes. "I know that was a lot to say."

I realized then I'd disassociated. I'd frozen and I'd become all but catatonic.

Just like that night…

If only I could've fought harder. Would it have changed anything? Probably not. There were too many of them. I think I'd thought it would be over quicker if I didn't fight so hard.

Royce had patted my head like a good little girl…

I ran my hands through my hair, nervously making sure I couldn't still feel the weight of his hand as I conjured it.

I shook my head, shooting to my feet as I turned away from him.

"It's not that. I'm not squeamish." I tried to catch my breath, but didn't really need to, so it was easier momentarily just to stop.

"Then what is it?" Emmett stood to his feet with me slowly.

"Nothing." I lied, my voice going up in pitch as I looked back at him.

He narrowed his eyes slightly, but didn't push me.

I couldn't focus. I couldn't decide what to say next. I wasn't here. I didn't exist.

"Rosalie… I shouldn't have told you that." Emmett worried, starting to reach out for me.

"No. I just... I was lost in thought." I frowned, trying to remember how to form words as I crossed my arms over my chest and curled my shoulders in terrible posture, but I just wanted to be as invisible as I could and just dissolve.

"Tell me what you were thinking, then." Emmett requested not realizing he was pushing me with his hand resting on my upper arm.

Invasion overwhelmed me and I could've screamed at the sheer weight of it.

"Come on, I'm not Edward." Emmett laughed without humor, still concerned as he looked over me.

"Thank God." I clenched my jaw, looking down at my feet.

Those weren't my feet. They weren't my boots. They weren't.

Emmett chuckled, thinking my statement was something of a sarcastic joke.

It wasn't.

My head spun rapidly and I tried to focus on a specific leaf stem on a tree a few yards away as I breathed in and out.

"Rose?" Emmett tried to pull me out of the bottomless pit I had fallen into but it was no use. He put both of his hands on the tops of my shoulders to tether me to reality.

"I don't know what to say." I breathed, speaking honestly as I finally snapped back to stand right under his gaze. "I'm... _sorry_."

Emmett was quiet then, waiting, but I noticed something shifted in him.

Some sort of _understanding_.

I felt intruded on, and incredibly vulnerable.

"You don't have to be. Not to me." Emmett repeated my earlier words, this time opting to trace his fingers across my hairline, tucking my hair behind my left ear.

I could've screamed.

He let his fingers linger on my face and I watched his eyes obviously settle on my mouth in a way that made me think he would kiss me.

I was glad he didn't.

Even though it didn't need to, I felt my breath hitch, catching in my throat.

"Growing up, I saw my father deal with a lot of stuff I couldn't understand; he'd physically be in the same room as me, but in his head… in his head he was millions of miles away." Emmett began slowly, but I was immediately on high alert because I had a sinking feeling he was talking about what just happened with me too.

He'd seen me disassociate worse than I had in quite a while.

I'd been floating above and beyond reality, but this hit me like a ton of bricks and I clenched my jaw, my body shaking and shivering nervously.

It was all different - what his father went through and what I went through. But did Emmett think it was manifesting similarly? Was that connection of our responses to trauma made in his mind before he brought this up?

With this, Emmett revealed he assumed trauma was in my past, and it scared me. I didn't even know what to process it as.

But, it certainly seemed _present_…

Not past…

I started to shake, trembling at a frequency of vibrations I could barely register even with vampire senses.

Emmett would figure me out. I didn't want him to know.

I was… ashamed.

I felt out of control and I so desperately wanted to curate the situation.

"And he…" Emmett went on.

"I'm sorry about your father." I said robotically as I cut him off.

I felt like I was floating over my body watching myself ice him out even though I didn't really want to.

I knew what he was trying to do though. He was trying to compare that moment of disassociation in me with his father's experience of his own trauma to get me to open up…

No. Not at all.

"I am too." Emmett said evenly, knowing I was on to him as he dropped his hands.

"_Really_." I emphasized, trying to make him see.

"I know, and I am too. _Really_." Emmett nodded, assuring me.

I tightened my jaw.

"Mostly because it didn't have to be that way for him." Emmett's brow furrowed a little so I saw he was trying to remain distant emotionally from the situation in order to recall it. "For _any_ of us."

I knew he was talking about his father and his family, but I couldn't help but think of how he was reminded by _me, _so in this moment... He was talking _about me_.

A weird guilt washed over me.

Like… like Emmett saw through me. Like my blonde hair and perfect face and heavenly smile wasn't enough to distract him.

He saw the ugliness that was festering behind my icily beautiful exterior.

He didn't look away.

"He didn't want anyone's help, and he pushed everyone away for as long as I can remember." Emmett told me like this was the answer to all the swimming questions and ominous guilt in my mind.

I pursed my lips, clenching my teeth together in worry. I felt defenses starting to rise…

"Do you think you could've actually helped him though?" I asked a bit sharper than I anticipated, but he didn't take it that way.

He didn't respond to my icy undertone, just shrugged.

"Maybe." Emmett remained distantly optimistic, but darkness was looming. "Maybe not. Maybe he needed one of those fancy doctors that looks inside your heart to see if it's all broken to pieces or something, or maybe he just needed all my Ma's saints and that God she prayed to. But, if I've learned anything living with a dozen some-odd people crammed in one house it's that there's nothin' in this world worth sufferin' through alone."

When he spoke deeply and quickly, his accent made his words soften together like melted butter, and it had quite an effect on melting _me_.

I took a deep breath, the scent of tobacco and thyme weakening my knees, but I maintained.

"Emmett, can I ask you something?"

He nodded.

"Anything." His voice was hopeful, like what guise he'd planned to get me to open up to him by positioning it as a conversation about his father had actually worked.

It hadn't. I wasn't stupid. I wasn't opening up.

"Would you have killed him if you'd had the chance?" I spoke softly, genuinely curious, but also selfishly and venomously making him think of something personally difficult so he'd get off my case.

"I… Well, I don't rightly know." Emmett sighed, admitting to me with a frown, falling into my trap. "Probably. I can't think real clear right now so killin' sounds about like the second best thing tangled in my head."

"And the first?" I tested though I knew the answer.

"Blood." Emmett confirmed my thought, and his eyes darkened already. "So… yeah, I probably would've killed him without thinking twice."

"Most often he was a goddamned bastard, but… Oh _shit_, I mean, sorry. God, I'm sorry. I don't like cursing in front of you. You're a lady."

He made a face, guilty and wide eyed over to me.

Somehow this lightened what was otherwise an unbearably heavy dialogue and I even found it in me to chuckle a little.

He smiled a light, easy smile, dimples indenting his cheeks.

"It's forgiven." I said breathily. "What were you going to say?"

"I was going to say I mean, most often… he _wasn't_ the greatest, but… _sometimes_ things were good. Sometimes, he was actually _fun_." Emmett shrugged with a little wistful smile. "Those rare moments. That's why I guess… I guess I'm glad I didn't have to kill him in the end. He got to choose his terms and_ I_ don't have to live with knowing I killed my own kin. I can't carry that shit for eternity. God, sorry again." Emmett huffed, ultimately dismissing the gravity of the situation by his lighthearted apology for cursing in front of me.

But really…_ I_'d been the one that prompted his family to leave his father behind because of my own fear of him and my own outsider's judgement that they would all be better off. Emmett hadn't told me to separate them, but I imagined that was the best thing to do so I made the decision and prompted his mother to leave.

I let all of this happen.

I shouldered the blame even though this wasn't rational.

"Emmett, I'm really sorry for all of this." My icy heart finally melted and I made sense of the tangle in my mind and addressed the pit in my stomach. "I… can't help but feel responsible."

"No. No. No. You aren't allowed to be sorry." He said powerfully.

"_I_ wanted them to get out… I mean, sure there was a part of me that always hoped he'd wanna be a better man and get out of here _with_ my Ma and my family, but he had too much pride to go back to my Ma's family money and her family's land even if it meant starving his children to death or suffering himself." Emmett was candid and open in a way I wasn't used to.

"You think that's where they are, back in Alabama?" I asked him.

"Oh, I'd bet my life on it. My Ma should'a done that a long time ago…" Emmett nodded unemotionally, not even characteristically pausing to acknowledge his word choice had been amusing because he didn't _have_ a life anymore.

He was dead.

"Now the real question is: was that piano destroyed _before_ or _after_ my Ma left?" Emmett was fixated.

I hadn't considered any of that and I took a deep swallow.

"She was pretty adamant about not leaving when I talked to her." I recalled tightly.

"Before, then." Emmett answered with a humorless snort, imagining this unforgivable crime is what finally made his mother decide to leave and take Emmett's sisters with her.

"When they woke up to Dorothy missing, I imagine things got pretty… intense. Dorothy was… well, Dorothy was his favorite _before_ everything_, _and my Pa doesn't really process being hurt himself without trying to hurt someone else; he knew smashing that piano was the best way to hurt my Ma 'cause he hates her for not being able to control Dorothy…"

A pit formed in my stomach.

Emmett knew too well the dynamics of hate and resentment within what was supposed to be a safe structure and model of love for him.

Then, I thought about my own parents…

They loved each other right? Mostly, they were distant life partners, just sharing a home and a goal to socially and economically reign superior by using their joint creation and prized possession: a beautiful daughter.

My parents didn't laugh or touch each other or smile or kiss - not like Carlisle and Esme…

Not like I imagined…

"Dorothy's safe." I told Emmett like it was a promise even though I didn't know for sure.

I just imagined…

"I trust you." Emmett told me three words I didn't think would mean so much to me as he turned toward me and gave me a sincere little half smile.

The air was thick between us and as we turned to walk back to find the others and start toward Alaska I felt his presence next to me filling the air like never before.

"You know, maybe in a couple decades it'd be safe to check on her. Discreetly of course." I filled his head with a fantasy.

I could tell he fancied it by the glittering optimism in his eyes.

"Really?"

"I'd imagine so." I couldn't see why not. "She'll be happy - with a husband and a house full of kids that play in the front yard. It might make you happy to see."

My words trailed out of my mouth like a ribbon of hopefulness, but it seemed to ring in his ears because he nodded, with a glorious smile.

"What about _your_ family?" Emmett asked. "Have you seen them since?"

"They're doing fine." I clenched my jaw recalling the last time I'd seen them.

I looked in on them the day I killed Royce. I was distracted and angry of course, but it made me angrier to see my parents fighting over money in the living room when I looked in on them.

"Do you miss them?"

"Not really. We weren't close." I said sourly.

"That's a shame. For them." Emmett's eyes held something in it I couldn't identify as he looked over at me.

But, it was something that calmed every nerve ending in my body, even when he put his hands on the tops of my shoulders and stopped us in our tracks.

"Because it'd be a mighty big privilege to be close to you." His eyes found mine, darting from pupil to pupil as he admired me in the moonlight, obviously awestruck by my beauty.

I thought he might try and kiss me, and it made my stomach twist into knots. But again, he didn't even try.

I found myself with a little smile on my lips.

"You know Rose, I haven't much thought about immortality before." Emmett exhaled and I worried he'd begun to feel its ominous oppression like I had.

I tried to remain removed as I returned his gaze.

"We'll live forever..." Emmett recalled.

"Yes." I responded evenly, trying to read what was in his eyes, but it was all just _enthusiasm_.

"So, what do you think _we'll_ be doing in a couple decades or hell, a hundred years from now?" Emmett asked, seeming to entertain some thoughts in his head that pleased him because his eyes sparkled brilliantly.

"Hmm, well, I don't know." I said, but I think now I was actually starting to get some ideas…


	12. Queen of Peace

_"Even when we first met Tanya's clan in Denali - all those females!" - Rosalie, Eclipse, p. 165 (Stephenie Meyer)_

Quick note: I loved writing this chapter hehehe. It's a lot more cerebral and emotional so not a lot happens per say but I definitely think it's important in character development as Rosalie and Emmett's journey to each other is not without obstacles. In chapters to come, expect some ExR developments, some shenanigans with the Denali clan, and... we haven't seen the last of Dorothy, or the new Rosalie McCarty and her life in Rochester... ;)

Please consider leaving a review. Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

* * *

_**Queen of Peace**_

_Oh, the king_  
_Gone mad within his suffering_  
_Called out for relief_  
_Someone cure him of his grief_

_His only son_  
_Cut down, but the battle won_  
_Oh, what is it worth_  
_When all that's left is hurt_

_Like the stars chase the sun_  
_Over the glowing hill, I will conquer_  
_Blood is running deep_

_Some things never sleep_

_And my love is no good_  
_Against the fortress that it made of you_  
_Blood is running deep_  
_Sorrow that you keep_

_Suddenly I'm overcome_  
_Dissolving like the setting sun_  
_Like a boat into oblivion_  
_Cause you're driving me away_

_Oh, the queen of peace_  
_Always does her best to please_  
_Is it any use_  
_Somebody's gotta lose_

* * *

**Carlisle: **_Trust_

Edward was driving now, keeping stiff posture and both hands gripping the wheel as we sped down the road. His eyes stared straight ahead with a frown, so I imagine not being able to escape mine and Emmett's thoughts for this long string of hours on the road was getting a little old.

We were close, after almost three full days of driving.

Emmett was folded into the back seat in a way that looked unnatural and uncomfortable for his height and brawn; his knees bounced incessantly like a bored child's so it practically vibrated the car. I could only imagine his thoughts were just as invasive and annoying. He was unsettled and _radiating_ with pent up energy.

It also didn't help he was desperate to be with Rosalie again. Rosalie had expertly manipulated the car pooling situation so that she and Emmett would be in opposite vehicles. It seemed she was avoiding him, even after what had appeared to be immense progress between the two of them.

I couldn't help but notice Emmett reach for Rosalie's hand as we made it back to meet Esme at the house we'd called our home for a couple years now and the home he'd been _born_ in, but before he could close his fingers around hers Rosalie had pulled away without a glance in his direction. Emmett had seemed surprised she'd retreated, though of course Edward and I weren't. Now, she didn't want to be in close quarters with him and give him the chance to try again.

She kept Emmett at arm's distance physically and emotionally as we all imagined she would, no matter how much I had hoped against it. I wanted that to be the one bright spot to all that had transpired lately.

Whatever was happening between them though seemed to look to her like a high speed train she couldn't slow down, so it appeared to make her nervous where it made him more confident to be forward.

It was evident she felt it was necessary to pump on the brakes with him now, and so.… she pulled away.

The world flew by around us, scenery changing rapidly across the country, but not so rapidly we didn't notice as it started to snow.

Emmett childishly grinned, the change distracting him enough to please him momentarily from the torture of staying still.

Snow really was beautiful, but since I'd been around for centuries, I'd begun to slowly become immune to the beauty of the world around me…

I didn't notice it until moments like this.

Emmett still possessed childlike _wonder_ in a way that the rest of my companions did not, and it was oddly refreshing. As I watched Emmett marveling at the snow, I saw the weather newly through his eyes and I noticed how beautiful it truly was once again…

"Have you seen snow before, Emmett?" I asked him, thinking about weather in the South.

I awkwardly tried to make conversation with him, but it was forced and _off_.

He was _different_ now.

"Not like this." He responded easily, fixated on the intricacy of the beautiful crystalline snowflakes.

His eyes had never seen snow with vampiric senses and the thrill lightened him momentarily.

The light in his crimson eyes glistened with enthusiasm, but I had to look away as I was reminded of all that had transpired in the past few days.

That _same _childlike enthusiasm as he looked at the snow was present in his eyes for a fleeting moment after looking at the severed body parts he'd left in his wake that night…

I worried about him in a way I didn't worry about the others. He was unapologetically _violent_. Sure, I knew Edward had sought to be a figure of vigilante justice and Esme had slipped a couple times in thirst. I also knew Rosalie had indulged in theatrical violence for her own pleasure and pursuit of justice, but Emmett's indulgence in violence didn't just_ please_ him, it _fueled_ him.

It was different with him, and his latest digression had been crossing a line of sorts.

I'd seen it in his eyes.

I'd heard it in his voice amidst the awful litter of those bodies in the grass when he told Rosalie he couldn't stop himself. He wasn't remorseful when he'd said that. He was… _in awe_.

He was in awe that he'd been able to do all of that on instincts he didn't know he'd had.

And,_ I'd_ let him do it…

No matter how just it seemed to give them their deaths, he was still let to run wilder than he should have.

He couldn't stop himself, and he didn't want to. Like a child that had never been told no, Emmett was left to utter recklessness, and I worried that this would be the beginning of his ruin.

I wondered if this had sent him over a moral edge he couldn't return from. Then, I wondered if he had any moral boundaries to begin with.

For someone so open, he was still very much a mystery to me.

I didn't know him.

None of us did really.

He was wild in a way none of the rest of us were. Not that I blamed his socio-economic class for this - I'd seen enough in my time to know that some of the most monstrous people were from the wealthy elite and trained in the best of manners - but Emmett had grown up in pursuit of survival in a lawless, rural land.

I imagined it had become habit for him to do what he _had_ to do.

Now, it was probably hard to depart from that.

Discipline is essential in maintaining a lifestyle like ours, and as hard as it would be, I had to talk to Emmett about his wrong doings and I wasn't looking forward to it.

The first time we'd made him detoxify from the blood in his body had been bad, but this time… This time would be worse.

This had been _fresh_ blood. From what I'd learned of his first transgression, the people Emmett had fed on first had been starving and anemic. Edward had told me this had affected the taste, and Emmett hadn't realized it until he fed on someone who had been well-fed themselves.

Like pigs fattened for the slaughter…

_Now_, he knew…

_Now_, he was different.

I'd understood the risk and danger that a newborn vampire was, and though Emmett was every bit of that terrifying loose canon and more, he seemed more in control when Rosalie was around. It fascinated me how easily he didn't snap at her when he was so blood drunk, but I didn't want to keep testing his limits…

I wondered though if her presence would soften the blow of our conversation about his wrongdoings, or just make it worse. After all, she had been the one to enable him…

I wondered what was going through Rosalie's mind then. Why did she encourage him?

I was then lost in thought about how it terrified me that Emmett's violence was cathartic to Rosalie.

I worried the worst… That they would leave again, choosing an immortal life of violence and blood, and _I_ would be responsible for the people they left in their wake…

Edward looked over at me with a raised eyebrow and shook his head, a private conversation as if he told me this wasn't something I should be worried about, or at least shouldn't fixate on.

He showed genuine care and concern in his eyes then, knowing I was deeply troubled.

I sighed.

The three of us had successfully avoided conversation of any sort of substance in our car, though I could see Emmett's usual weightlessness looked a bit more burdened on the drive to Alaska.

Emmett's father's death and the gutting of his family had been buried under the violence of Emmett's latest kills, and I wondered if he was avoiding processing this pain by reverting to that violence. I wondered if amidst the newborn emotional overload, he could even realize if this was the truth.

"Are we there yet?" Emmett asked enthusiastically and lightened.

"Almost." I said expectantly with a little, careful smile.

"Who 're these people we're goin' to see anyway?" Emmett went on, again impossibly light.

"Well, I first heard of them years ago very briefly; there were rumors around the Volturi of an older coven that had success in a lifestyle built on animal blood and familial structure for a coven." I went on. "I think that meeting them will provide a nice model for an ethical diet and prove productive for your transition. And Rosalie's…"

I added the last bit so he wouldn't feel singled out, and I had to remind myself Rosalie was still very much a newborn even though she didn't much act like it. She had expressed little to no interest in human blood since the beginning.

"How many of us are there?" Emmett asked. "How many people like us? Vampires I mean? And, Vol-what?"

"Well, it's impossible to know really, but a great many more than you'd expect. The Volturi… Well, they act as a governing body over vampires, making sure we don't expose our secrets to humans, act irresponsibly in changing new vampires, things like that…" I went on carefully seeing him process this with disinterest now. "I spent a brief period of time with the Volturi, but left over differences in preferred diet. I needed to find more to this existence. So far though, the coven in Denali are the only others I've found that survive on animal blood."

"How'd you find 'em?" Emmett wondered.

"Lots of digging and rumors. Following leads and whatnot…" I shrugged.

"How'd you find Rosalie?" Emmett asked me, changing the subject so abruptly it made my head spin, but as I looked to Edward he still wore a sour look so I imagined it had been brewing in Emmett's thoughts for quite some time and he finally asked this heavy question. "When she died I mean."

"Well…" I exhaled, looking out the window at the snow and thinking about how it had been unseasonably cold that horrible night.

I tried not to reveal any information that would prove too personal while also maintaining evenness in conversation.

"I was a doctor in Rochester at the time, and I… smelled the blood." I answered as straightly as I could.

Emmett clenched his jaw, obviously displeased, but not necessarily at my answer. The look in his eye made it obvious the thought of Rosalie being hurt absolutely killed him.

It revealed humanness in him that transcended his newborn instincts, but in anger, he'd still first resort to violence and chaos…

I saw it in his eyes.

"It was bad?" Emmett asked, his voice low and dark.

"Unimaginable." I answered, wincing. "That's why I had to intervene. It was… too much... too much _waste_. I'd known who she was before… We'd been in Rochester for a bit."

He stayed quiet for a second, and I could tell he was thinking vividly as Edward's fingers wrapped around the wheel tightly.

"She told me what she did. Do you think it was a fair trade? Her life for theirs?" Emmett asked, his voice full of darkness.

I felt his eyes heavy on me.

I wondered then if he knew…

Edward frowned a little, and I noticed this. She'd told Emmett a little, but not a lot.

It was enough to make him curious, but I remained distant.

"No." I swallowed, turning over my shoulder to look straight into his vermillion eyes.

"To avoid breakin' her confidence… She thinks y'all both do." Emmett furrowed his brow, obviously not anticipating my answer, but the opposite. "I think it _hurts_ her."

"Really…" Edward breathed, but it wasn't ironic.

This was a thought she had kept even from him.

There was something marvelously victorious about Emmett revealing something about Rosalie only _he_ knew, but this was no time for that. It was heavy and awful to realize that this was something burdening her. I took a deep breath.

"There's no justice for what happened to Rosalie. I know that. Edward knows that." I made sure to tell him. "But, I made a judgment call that night thinking that if she didn't _die _that it could assuage _some _of the tragedy, and…"

Emmett nodded, starting to accept this even though this wasn't a conversation we should be having with him. It was a conversation I should be having with _Rosalie_…

"Emmett, there's something you have to understand." Edward interrupted me, obviously speaking to Emmett's thoughts that clouded the communication of the truth.

Emmett's vermillion eyes were alert and fiery at the shift in tone as Edward entered discussion.

"Rosalie doesn't look at this life like you do." Edward said. "That's why she'll never think _anything_'s a fair trade for what she lost."

"What do you mean?" Emmett stopped in his thoughts and shifted forward inquisitively.

"You see this existence as a gift - an _after life alternative_ if you will. But, she… _doesn't_." Edward clarified aloud. "Rosalie's… _not_ glad she didn't die that night in New York."

"Why?" Emmett puzzled, asking pointedly this brewing question.

His eyes came to me now, _not_ the one who could read her mind.

I cleared my throat.

"Rosalie knows that I would _never_ give this life to someone that had another choice." I explained to him in a somber way. "It was a risk I took when I changed all of you, and when it turned out how it did with Rosalie… I promised she would be the last." I told him.

"But she wasn't." Emmett observed.

"No. She wasn't." I said plainly.

Edward's expression changed a little and I could see Emmett was forthcoming with his thoughts because he was _more_ than forthcoming with his words.

"Rosalie _asked_ for my change." Emmett began.

"And… you couldn't say no after what you did to her? Knowing how she hated you for it?" Emmett recalled, seeming to test my boundaries a little with his tone and his fiery red eyes.

"Emmett, your death would've been long and unnecessarily painful… You would've suffered a lot before you died because the medical technology required was inaccessible at the time." I explained. "I felt it was inhumane so…"

"So you made it up to her by changing me." Emmett tried to get me to say it. "Am I your peace offering to her?"

I furrowed my brow.

Something in his eyes told me he was challenging me.

"Rosalie would have tried to do it herself if Carlisle hadn't agreed." Edward said, seeming to push back against Emmett in a way that felt defensive.

I was on edge.

"Do you think that _I'm_ a fair trade, then?" Emmett pushed. "Do you think she believes you're _even_ now?…"

"Well, that's up to her." I gave a little smile trying to lighten things as I entered a very difficult conversation.

"But, I asked _you_." Emmett challenged me.

He challenged me in a way that I didn't understand. I'd never been a father, but I imagined Emmett was testing me to see how far he could push before I'd push him back. I wasn't falling for it.

It wasn't hostile, but I was afraid that it could be.

"Emmett, she deserves the _best_ of you, wouldn't you agree?"

I tried to guide him into realizing the wrongfulness of his previous actions and the standard of this existence that was required of him. I tried to put this in the context of his relationship to Rosalie and how following the rules was the best way to maintain relationships built on the emotional spectrum of humanity.

"You're talking about what I did?" He didn't respond to my lightheartedness as he positioned his words in a half statement half question. "It makes me less of a bargaining chip when I act up?"

His eyes glistened with darkness and it gave me a chill.

"No. I want you to try to follow the rules. For Rosalie. For this family. For yourself." I countered.

"I did something you didn't like." Emmett stated, but it was framed like a question.

He didn't think what he'd done was wrong, and as horrifyingly awful as those people might have been, I didn't know if it was right to meddle in human affairs. It was a slippery slope of godlike power deciding who gets to live and die…

I worried immensely for him.

"You are not what you've done. You can be better." I nodded, trying to keep my voice full of compassion and forgiveness, even though I didn't really answer his question.

"What if I can't?" He asked as if he wanted me to give up.

"You _will._" I insisted, a little more powerfully than I'd anticipated and our eyes burned into one another's.

The deep red of his eyes taunted me. Yes, Edward had rebelled, but it didn't feel like he was rebelling against _me_. Edward rebelled against concepts and institutions like diet, loneliness, and existential purpose, but with Emmett it was much more simple than that. He was rebelling against _me_.

I wanted to know why.

It didn't seem like it bothered him to be used as a 'peace offering' or a 'bargaining chip' for Rosalie's happiness with me. In fact, it almost had the opposite effect because it made him aware of how _she wanted_ him changed even if he didn't understand why.

"We're here." Edward announced easily, happy to be cutting off that conversation.

The Denali coven's home became visible on the horizon.

Emmett was like a lit fuse then, ready to explode. His weightiness was immediately a thing of the past and he was filled with unbridled joy.

His eyes darted out the window, wanting to jump out of the moving car and run the rest of the way, so he did.

His feet barely left an imprint in the freshly fallen snow as he ran, speeding past the limitations of the car.

Emmett was radiating with pent up energy, his eyes darting around and drinking in every detail, but no detail was as important as Rosalie.

He made it immediately to her door, opening it in his newborn speed before her fingers had even touched the handle.

As she met his eyes with surprise, she stepped out of the car and stood under his adoring gaze.

The night sky glowed with stars, but Emmett beamed a celestial smile at the sight of her, immediately forgetting the heaviness in which we just spoke.

He was doomed.

Rosalie was acutely aware of his presence and she gave him a small, controlled smile. But, it was more pleasant than she'd ever smiled at anyone else so I considered it a success.

I exhaled.

"Thank you. That was kind." Rosalie acknowledged lightly and removedly as she batted her long black eyelashes against the falling snow.

"I know how a beautiful lady should be treated." Emmett promised her with a smile.

I could tell obviously that he was straining to keep his voice even and unbothered by the way it vibrated in his throat.

Rosalie wasn't as pleased with his advances as I would've imagined and she just breathed a little laugh at his forwardness before she looked away.

He tried to maintain an image of being cool and collected, but he was far from it. He was still blood drunk, and I worried it was heightening his emotions to manic levels. His mood swings were enough to give anyone whiplash.

"Stop worrying about anything other than how bad he is at romance." Edward put his hand on my shoulder, giving me a half smile of comfort as he whispered this to me. "At this rate, it'll take them a half century to get together."

He saw how rampant my mind ran; how much weight I harbored.

I allowed a little laugh at Emmett's attempt at sweet talking before I looked over to find my own love.

I myself had truly missed the sight of Esme's beautiful face and as she smiled, my world shifted back into orbit and I felt a little lighter already.

"I missed you." Esme grinned as she laced her fingers through mine.

I felt her weightiness immediately.

"What's wrong?" I asked, my eyes darting over her face in search of clues.

"Is Emmett all right?" She asked, genuinely full of worry and care as she shot her gaze toward him as he followed Rosalie like a puppy. "Rosalie told me about his father."

Rosalie kept her fingers interlocked and her posture far from open as they talked. Her eyes fluttered to the ground often in nervousness and distance resembling that of an early teenager.

"As he can be…" I admitted. "I'm worried he's sublimating and he'll snap soon."

"Me too." Esme breathed. "He needs us, as a family, now more than ever."

Her kind, considerate heart was one of the most beautiful things about her, and I couldn't help but kiss her porcelain cheek in comfort after seeing an ounce of rain in her eyes.

"Esme, Emmett… Well, he… _tried_ something with me in the car a little earlier. He pushed back a little." I admitted, for the first time having the threat of true conflict with one of my creations.

Esme comforted me with just her presence, but her hand on my cheek was even more of a haven from the stress.

It was a harrowing feeling, like there was something _inherently wrong with me_ because I felt him begin to challenge me.

Did I deserve to be leading him?

"What do you mean?" Esme frowned a little.

"He started asking _questions_… about Rosalie. About _purpose_. About whether or not I changed him as a peace offering to her." I exhaled, feeling absurd even saying it out loud again.

"Oh no." Esme swallowed nervously. "Is he… resenting this life?"

Her eyes were unimaginably gold and full of concern and love.

She centered me.

"No… It's strange." I exhaled. "It's like he… just resents _me_."

Edward seemed to have some insight, but I hated using him as a spy or a translator.

Before Edward could even look over at me, Tanya emerged from the house and shot a glorious smile in our direction.

"Friends!" She called with glee.

Immediately, I felt the camaraderie, and I noticed how even acknowledging the two new vampires in our coven, Tanya's eyes still landed on Edward.

I still had hope, even though he'd snubbed her the first time.

Tanya was joined then by her coven sisters Irina and Kate.

I couldn't fight my smile. It pleased me to no end to be reunited with friends, and I was optimistic that our newly minted coven of five could one day find the bonds these five also shared.

"Thank you for hosting us, Tanya!" I said as we made our way forward.

I clapped my hand on Emmett's shoulder, in a way claiming him as my own, and motioning him forward.

His eyes dropped to my hand on his shoulder for a moment in a way that made me retract it from contact with him. No one noticed the awkwardness between us, but I certainly felt it.

He didn't accept my contact and more than he accepted my leadership. I thought briefly of what Edward had told me about Emmett's father's tendencies toward violence. I wondered if this made Emmett skeptical of my intentions and caused the constant burning of his eyes when I tried to lead him.

"Oh Carlisle, of course it's no trouble." Tanya smiled, seeming to take in Emmett's intimidating size and red eyes. "We always have room for you. Though there are a couple new Cullens since we last saw each other."

"Rosalie Hale." Rosalie introduced herself without offering her hand. "How do you do?"

She gave a little, pleasant smile and a nod of her head as would be required by perfect social graces, but nothing more.

That was Rosalie in a nutshell.

"Oh, it's just lovely to meet you, Rosalie." Tanya smiled warmly.

I would have been lying if I said I hadn't noticed during the exchange of perfectly mandated pleasantries between Rosalie and the others that Emmett's eyes were trailing heavily over Kate before he looked back to Tanya with a charming, dimpled smile.

He was a vampire yes, but he was still a man and Kate was still _exquisitely_ beautiful.

All of these women were.

He couldn't be blamed by anyone but Rosalie, and of course she noticed his fixation though it was nothing compared to the way he looked at her.

She couldn't see that from the inside though, and the first shred of insecurity I'd ever seen in Rosalie's face flashed like a horrible shooting star over her expression.

"Emmett." He reached out his hand with open friendliness shaking Tanya's hand as he would any man's. "The other new kid."

The corner of Kate's mouth turned up in a way that looked amused.

She offered her own hand to Emmett.

"Kate. Charmed, I'm sure." Kate said in a voice that was obviously lowered slightly for him to notice.

He pulled his hand back immediately from hers.

"What was that?" He frowned, looking down at his hand with wide eyes.

Edward exhaled through his nose.

"Psychic electrokinesis." She winked, ancient traces of her Russian accent weaving through her words as she giggled.

"Now, wait a second 'cause those words definitely don't sound like English." Emmett joked, his accent emphasized to make him more charming.

And he knew it.

If I didn't know any better I'd say he was flirting with her.

"Oh, it's just a _spark_." Kate smirked, obviously flirting with him.

I thought Rosalie was going to spontaneously combust as her jaw clenched in a way that made it obvious she was straining to keep calm.

"Come on Kate, stop showing off to our guests. It's rude." Irina rolled her eyes. "I'm Irina. It's a pleasure."

Emmett gave them both another grin, but again he was enchanted with Kate. Kate's hair was long, straight, and white blonde as corn silk that complemented her snowy skin and darkening amber eyes. She was tall, though not as tall as Rosalie, but Kate was of a more athletic build so she seemed to make Rosalie seem smaller than her. Kate was obviously beautiful, exquisitely so, but nothing compared to Rosalie.

However, men were simple and Kate's attention to him was enough to distract Emmett momentarily.

With greetings and pleasantries all around, and Emmett's wayward eyes indulging in the scenery both of Denali's natural beauty and Denali's beautiful inhabitants, we followed the rest of them toward the house.

"Carmen and Eleazar are out hunting for the moment." Tanya explained. "They'll be thrilled to see you and meet you all."

Emmett paused before the front door his gaze taking in the magnitude of their residence as he stood on the front steps.

Rosalie watched him with curious eyes as the live wire began to fizzle in him.

"I'd sooner burst into flames than be cooped up again." Emmett exhaled impatiently under his breath. "I swear I'm 'bout to go stark ravin' mad if I don't _run_. Why don't y'all show me around?"

"I'm due for a hunt anyway." Kate jumped at the opportunity before Rosalie could even open her mouth, giving a little smile.

Rosalie didn't play this game. She wasn't aggressive, and she'd been bested this round.

"Emmett, I don't think you should go hunting." I spoke up, disciplining him now with the slightest bit of nervousness.

"But, I'm… _thirsty_." His eyes grew darker as he pushed back against my authority a little, challenge in his eyes.

"Carlisle, we've been hunting animals for centuries. Longer than you've been alive. We can handle monitoring his transition." Kate tried to comfort me, but really just undermined me and what I was trying to do with Emmett. "We helped Eleazar and Carmen after all."

We needed to put up a united front if we were going to get control over Emmett, and right now it was obvious he saw our disparity in approach, like disagreeing parents.

"Absolutely. We can do this." Tanya nodded in agreement.

In many ways they did exhibit far more control than I did, but I worried they were too lax for someone like Emmett.

He'd run over them. He was headstrong.

"I'll go with you." Edward offered, completely uninvited, but reading the thoughts around him caused him to volunteer.

He knew he was needed to make sure Emmett didn't cause any trouble and that he behaved himself in more than a few ways.

"Me too." Tanya jumped in.

"Rose, what about you?" Emmett wasn't subtle, and he assumed it was gentlemanly to let the other ladies know he was spoken for, or at least hoped he was.

It didn't deter Kate's confidence one bit. She didn't even flinch, but Rosalie on the other hand seemed affected by his question.

"No, thank you. I need to get settled." Rosalie said icily, rejecting his offer as a shallow punishment for giving a shred of attention to anyone else but her.

"I'll wait for you." He insisted.

"That won't be necessary." Rosalie said, looking straight up into his eyes as she stepped by him to follow Irina inside.

You didn't have to be a genius to see that Rosalie was testing to see how far he'd chase her.

"Oh come on, Rose. It'll be fun." Emmett grinned at her in a way that was all at once hopeful and acknowledging of his losing battle with her.

"I'm sure it will." She challenged him before she turned her back.

"Roooose, come with us." He pushed her again. "I've never seen Alaska. I want you to see it with me."

This time, he grabbed her hand, claiming it in his.

Though it was hardly a groping grab at her with bad intentions, and was actually more like a child playfully grabbing for the attention of an adult, Rosalie was still pushed to an edge she was less forgiving at because he had grabbed her.

No one but those who knew would have been able to see the tension. Esme's fingers tightened on the crook of my arm, but everyone else was still smiling pleasantly.

Emmett had chased her to a point she wasn't happy with. He misunderstood how she wanted him to display his devotion, and it was going to cost him.

"Excuse me." Her eyes had flared with alarm and her voice only rose slightly as she withered away to dip under his gaze and head inside.

"Rosalie?" He called after her, but she ignored him.

Emmett took a lingering look at her back, but there was frustration and annoyance in the tight way he held his jaw and the long exhale through his nose.

"She's missing out. You haven't hunted until you've hunted in Denali." Kate pulled him back to the conversation at hand.

I worried. They hadn't surveyed the area. So much could go wrong.

His eyes darkened by the second as he imagined hunting, but he darted his gaze toward the open door.

"Yeah, all this carryin' on's worked up quite a thirst. Let's get goin' on this so called legendary huntin'" Emmett charmed Kate easily as he leaned into his Southern accent, giving her a wink.

"Try to keep up." She offered her hand, and he smiled a dimpled smile in her direction before he took it and they both took off running toward the Denali wilderness in a race of sorts.

"Be careful." I insisted with an unwavering stare in Emmett's direction, but he didn't notice before he was gone, so Edward just nodded on his behalf.

"Oh Carlisle, stop worrying will you?" Tanya snickered, running after them.

I wiped a hand over my face, exasperated before Esme and I walked back toward the house, shutting the door behind us.

I imagined Rosalie had been in eye sight and she had seen what had happened between Emmett and Kate through the window. She wrung her hands, but overall she showed no true emotion as she took in the beauty of the Denali house and pleasantly conversed with Irina.

She was avoiding my eyes as she looked over the ceiling's high beams.

"Come on, I'll show you your rooms." Irina encouraged with a smile and the three of us followed her down the hall.

"Rosalie, you could've…" Esme began to tell her she could've gone with them.

"I didn't _want_ to." Rosalie's eyes darted her way in a warning of sorts, dismissing the conversation quickly.

Irina led Esme and I to a room on the first floor that was decorated with emphasis on minimalism and functionality, looking much different than a modern American home, but instead taking influence from Nordic aesthetic. Clean lines and light colors all around the room made the home feel as snowy as its exterior.

"I hope this suits you." Irina was a lot more reserved than her extroverted sisters, and she operated with a melancholy calmness that exuded from her.

"It's just lovely!" Esme complimented. "We just so appreciate you opening your home to us in this time of transition."

The women were immediately enthralled in conversation, and I knew Rosalie was participating sheerly because she was avoiding conversation with me.

Rosalie avoided my eyes the rest of the night, and I knew it was obvious that her earlier choice was a difficult one because it was either give in to Emmett or be subjected to prodding conversation with Esme and I. After Rosalie was shown her room, and the sun began to rise as she tinkered with settling all of her things in, I knew I had to finally ask her.

I felt Rosalie's reticence as if she knew when I inhaled to speak what was coming.

"Why did you encourage Emmett to kill his father?" I asked as evenly as I could.

Esme tried to look unbothered as she helped Rosalie hang up clothes in the closet.

"I didn't. I just went along with it." Rosalie dismissed. "He needed babysitting. That's why I went with him."

She kept her back to Esme and I as she arranged some scarves into a drawer so we couldn't see her eyes and tell if she was lying.

"No, you _wanted _him to do it." I argued with her to see how she would respond.

She wasn't used to me challenging her and her eyes went wide with guilt before she turned away again.

"It doesn't matter." She sighed under her breath.

"Sure, it does." I argued. "You ran away from home because of it."

"It was only supposed to be temporary." Rosalie mumbled, frowning a little as she perceived my pain over them leaving us. "We didn't plan on _staying_ gone…."

"He's not accusing you of anything, Rosalie. We're just trying to understand…" Esme spoke calmly, more eloquent than I could have been.

She knew just how to connect with people.

Rosalie fiddled with folding and unfolding a scarf as she took a long pause to think.

"We need to understand this because we're trying to understand Emmett." I added on.

"I don't know why you're asking _me_ then." Rosalie added coldly.

"Because you know him better than the rest of us. You know his family." Esme said, presenting a united front with me as she took my hand. "You have insight to his upbringing that we don't have."

Rosalie sighed, not wanting all the heavy insight that she had.

"The ease of Emmett's transition directly affects you, too, if you're pursuing a relationship with him." I added pragmatically.

Rosalie wrinkled her nose slightly, but I could tell the distaste was for show.

"Then maybe that'll become _Kate's_ problem." Rosalie said tartly.

She was being difficult because she felt vulnerable.

"Is that what you want?" Esme asked the difficult questions.

"I _want_ to stop being interrogated." Rosalie huffed exasperatedly, rolling her eyes.

"_You _pushed him away." Esme perceived, raising her eyebrow.

Rosalie's hands fell idle and she clenched her jaw, signaling she was done talking to us.

"He needs you right now Rosalie, now more than ever. He needs this family." I tried a softer approach. "We need to know him and his motivations to help us choose the best approach in aiding not only his _diet_ transition, but his transition into this family, however that may be."

Rosalie still didn't turn around, but I saw her shoulders rise with tension.

"There's a real possibility he might go his own way, Rosalie, and if we don't want that to happen we have to act accordingly. He's already proven to question my intentions and authority… He doesn't believe I'm trying to help him… He…" I went on.

"_He doesn't trust you_." Rosalie said finally, her words cracking like a whip.

It physically pained me to hear these words that Rosalie believed to be true. She knew him in ways we didn't and it saddened me that this was her conclusion.

Her eyes burned into mine, satisfied with what she'd said.

"Rosalie…" Esme began to scold sadly.

"His mother was _weak_ and too afraid to do what it took to take care of her own children. His father was a drunken_ fool _that couldn't provide for or protect his family. He'd hit them. All of them. The people that were _supposed_ to take care of him _didn't_. I'd imagine Emmett doesn't trust you - _ANY _of you - to have his best interests in mind."

She said this to me with burning golden eyes full of suppressed anger. Even though she was talking about Emmett, I couldn't help but think she was talking about _herself _too.

I'd been so worried about him, I hadn't bothered to look at what was happening with her since she'd returned from killing her attackers.

Her jaw clenched before she turned back to keeping her hands busy.

"Do _you_?" I asked calmly. "Trust us to have _your_ best interests in mind?"

Rosalie didn't respond.

I felt Esme's sadness and heartache fill the icy air.

"Rosalie, I truly hope that one day you'll find it in your heart to forgive me." I breathed.

She turned, her eyes darting over my face to read me so she wouldn't be blindsided. She hated that. This had blindsided her.

"I made a judgment call the night I changed you. I thought that maybe if you didn't die it'd assuage _some_ of the tragedy… That…"

"That I'd make _Edward_ happy." Rosalie spoke through her teeth angrily and her eyes held a glassiness to them that reminded me of human tears, but she wasn't sad... She was irate.

"Well…" I frowned.

"You just changed me to _please_ him and you didn't even_ try_ to hide it. The moment I wake up and you're both pushing _Edward_ on me? And it's obvious not once did you think about how that would _bother_ me?!" Rosalie's voice rose slightly as she exploded with loads of pent up emotion. "I was beautiful and you thought that'd be enough to make Edward_ like_ me… _That's_ what got me killed in the first place, being _beautiful_. You were _using_ me... And now, you're using me _again_ to get your way with Emmett?! God, am I not good enough for _anything_ else in this world?!"

Rosalie tossed a vase across the room so it shattered behind my head.

She was in pain.

The insight she let us in on was shocking and I stood there staring at her for a long moment.

"Rosalie… I was just going to say that yes, in the beginning, I hoped you and Edward could find what Esme and I had found in each other, but more than all of that I hoped _you_ could find happiness and peace in this life." I spoke as calmly as I could to counter her rage. "I hoped that _you_ could find purpose in this existence - someone to love you, truly _love_ you to make up for all the hurt and heartache you experienced in your human life."

Esme's eyes were wide as she looked between us.

"No." Rosalie shook her head, disagreeing in a blanket way to all that had been said.

"And_ we_ _love_ you, Rosalie. We do." Esme breathed. "We love you with our whole hearts, so no, we are not using you to get our way with Emmett, but _your way_. Frankly dear, he was changed for _you_. For the hope of _your_ happiness. We want him to be better for _you_. We want him to stay for _you_."

Rosalie inhaled, taking swift shallow breaths as she turned away from us in anger.

But, Esme was right.

"This existence is a lonely one without someone that loves you, and no amount of vengeance can fill that hole in your heart, Rosalie." I said softly, not daring to push any harder. "There is no justice for what happened to you. No matter how many people die for it…"

Rosalie's fingers curled tightly around the edges of the dresser and her shoulders rose in tension.

"There's no justice for _any_ of the tragedy of our human lives…" Esme added, speaking from personal experience. "But we can love… We can find _family_… someone to pass the decades with, smile with, laugh with, try new things and watch the world change with. _That's_ the only way to find meaning and purpose in this life. Not revenge…"

Esme's heartache directly throbbed in my chest, and I put my arm around her shoulders.

"It will keep you _lonely_." Esme finished, speaking tenderly to Rosalie's back.

Rosalie's hands shook in what I imagined to be anger and rage and the way she clawed her fingers had imprinted upon the edges of the vanity, but after a long lingering moment of silence, she finally softened.

"It's a ridiculous reason… Really…" Rosalie snorted, slowly turning to face us as she finally answered my earlier question. "I can't believe...

Esme and I exhaled in unison, in awe of Rosalie's looming attempt at honesty.

"The only thing that's ridiculous is that you'd believe we don't love you. Unconditionally." Esme assured her. "You can talk to us about anything."

"All right, well, I thought… I thought that if Emmett would kill his father it would prove he wasn't anything like him and he rejected everything he was and everything he did. That Emmett would never… he would never _hit_ me like his father hit his family." Rosalie said through her teeth, finally opening up to Esme and I.

Esme and I both stood in shock, unsure of how to respond.

"No one will _ever_ put their hands on you again, Rosalie." I promised in a dark covenant.

Esme and I looked at each other in deep sadness over Rosalie's afflictions.

Rosalie nodded and sat down on the edge of the fainting couch with perfect posture folding her hands in her lap and looking down at her fingers.

I worried about Emmett's violence, how it affected her. How it must've frightened her...

"I think I'm beginning to believe that." Rosalie nodded, but her eyes were hollow.

"You know, Emmett killed those people that way because they… they _hurt_ his sister. Dorothy. Like _I'd_ been hurt." Rosalie said in the softest voice I'd ever heard her use. "He didn't kill those people for _me_. He doesn't even know… but… but it _feels_ like he did."

I understood immediately what had actually happened that horrible night.

It was more than thirst for him…

It was vengeance…

And for Rosalie, it was the moment she realized she loved him.

And now, she was scared to death.


	13. What Kind of Man

_"And, oddly enough, he needs me, too. That part worked out better than I could have hoped." - Rosalie, Eclipse, p. 165 (Stephenie Meyer)_

Quick note: I got a little indulgent in this chapter. It's an extended length, just because I just love you all so much and want to thank you for your support! I also just loved writing this chapter hehehe! It's also very cerebral and emotional like the last chapter, but I put it in Emmett's newborn perspective.

I found that when I was exploring his character development and study, I wanted to touch on 'disjointedness' or that feeling of being 'off.' He is in a grand transition in so many ways, and I think it would wear on him and his identity, particularly following his first big move away from the home he'd known and invested in for the bigger part of his life. I felt an identity struggle was inevitable in Emmett's current situation with the death of his father, his tension with Carlisle as a father figure, his pining for Rosalie, his infatuation with Kate (representative of his other relationships with women), his lifestyle change, his recent kills, etc. While he is lighthearted and seen as unburdened in the Twilight series, I don't know if I believe this liberation didn't come without struggle and obstacles early on. I went from a first person to a third person to illustrate this sort of "identity crisis" Emmett is having as he is detaching from his Tennessee country home and his sense of self that was wrapped up in his family and the natural heritage of his land.

I also really loved this sentence from Eclipse and wanted to explore why Emmett would 'NEED' Rosalie. I think his background of being a 'nobody' and being constantly told he is worthless is an interesting contrast to Rosalie's background of adoration and worship, but both are inherently damaging because both of them just need to feel _seen_. He needs Rosalie particularly in this quest for 'self' and identity within his newborn stage, but also I think he could need her to make him believe he's full of worth and purpose after a life of abuse.

An overarching build in this chapter is around not only Emmett's relationship with himself, Rosalie, and Carlisle, but also Emmett's relationship to the moral 'right' or 'correct' in his own conviction rather than reliance on structures like religious morality or Carlisle's guidance.

Prepare yourselves for some Denali clan shenanigans as promised in this chapter, and a little bit of ExR development as well! 3 eeep finally

Please consider leaving a review. Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

TW/CW: Abuse

* * *

**_What Kind of Man_**

_I was on a heavy tip_  
_Try'na cross a canyon with a broken limb_  
_You were on the other side, like always_  
_Wondering what to do with life_

_I'd already had a sip_  
_So I'd reasoned I was drunk enough to deal with it_  
_You were on the other side, like always_  
_You could never make you mine_

_You're a holy fool, all coloured blue_  
_Red feet upon the floor_  
_You do such damage, how do you manage?_  
_Trying to crawl in back for more_

_And with one kiss_  
_You inspired a fire of devotion that lasts for twenty years_  
_What kind of man loves like this?_

* * *

**_1928_**

_"John, stop it. Please." Helen McCarty begged, her voice shaking with real terror._

_It had never been like this before._

_Her gangly, thirteen year old son pushed up to his hands and knees from the floor, spitting out one of his molars in a fountain of blood. His concussed head spun as he wobbled to his feet, the world whirring around him, but he stood strong. He had to._

_"But, I aint learnt no lesson." Her stubborn boy coughed a little laugh, bright red blood dripping from his crazed smile._

_"He's had enough." Helen whispered, her son stumbling backward and knocking into the door frame. "Emmett, tell him you've had enough. Come on, darling."_

_She pleaded, but it was no use trying to reason with either of the men in her life in times like these._

_It had never been this bad before though…_

_Emmett willed every saint in heaven to make sure he didn't pass out and give his father that satisfaction. He held himself up at the threshold of the door and took a deep, shaking breath to feel a sharp pain at his ribs on his right side._

_But, Emmett couldn't think about anything like that right now. He left his body in moments like this, and lately moments like this had been getting more frequent in perfect proportion with the increase in his juvenile delinquency and outright rebellion at the threshold of his teenage years._

_"I'll say when he's had enough." John growled, throwing the back of his hand so it landed with a pop on the face that reminded him of his lost youth and innocence._

_When his son's face was bloody and broken, that's when he really recognized himself because there was something broken in John that'd never get fixed. That's when he really saw that his son looked like him, but it only scared him even more and John was a man that didn't admit to fear because that sort of thing was for weak men. He was just a kid when he was shipped off to fight in a war he didn't understand; it was a war that was supposed to end all wars…_

_But, he'd been fighting every day since._

_"Your hands'll break 'fore I've had enough, and you know it." Emmett stood taller with a challenge, wiping the blood from his mouth with the back of his hand._

_He woozily swayed on his feet, but his eyes were sharply focused as he puffed out his chest and stood taller to look up at his father._

_The gap between their eyes was closing as Emmett grew taller and taller with each passing day._

_"Emmett, honey, tell your father you're sorry." Helen stepped forward, putting her hand on her son's chest._

_In this moment of contact, she felt the rapid beating of his heart and he leaned into her hand._

_His dark eyes were dilated into black holes as she looked into them. Bruises were already swelling up around them and a deep, bleeding gash at his cheekbone would have to be stitched up later._

_His ragged breath slowed and he blinked a long blink that signaled he was fading. He was stubborn though, and he'd make sure he didn't fade before his father wore himself out._

_When Helen stepped in, she knew it was no use, but she still tried sometimes._

_It was tangled in her mind whether or not she was trying to free her son from a beating she wasn't sure he deserved or to prove herself to her husband that had charmed her all those years ago at a winter dance at a country club. She had figured he would push her, hit her, or be rough with her when she didn't live up to her wifely duties. After all, her father smacked her mother around when she upset him too. That was normal. That was accepted._

_Even in the beginning, when he'd pop one of their daughters in the mouth for being smart, or push Emmett around to 'toughen him up' she hadn't batted an eye. She thought that you got the beating you deserved._

_So, Helen McCarty tried to never mess up. She lived not to mess up and get on the wrong side of her husband's anger, but Emmett messed up all the time - most of the time on purpose just for the hell of it or to take the focus of the beatings off of one of his sisters._

_Sometimes Helen McCarty felt guilty that when she saw Emmett getting the shit beat out of him, she was glad it wasn't her. She thought herself a cruel, heartless woman, watching as her children collected colorful bruises and broken bones, but she was more afraid and more used to the routine of it all than anything._

_And she was glad it wasn't her._

_Now, as her son turned to face his father again defiantly, she wasn't sure it had ever been this bad. The truth was, it hadn't, but it had been a slow decline into the hellishness that now ensued as the most intense punishment her husband could thing of._

_"You know, I look in your eyes and I see Satan himself." John McCarty spat, pushing on his son's chest so he fell back and his head hit against the wall where there was already a hole in the plaster from a bout like this a couple weeks back._

_"Get out of my sight." He snarled as Emmett scrambled back up to his feet only to be shoved back down again and be told to stay down with a swift kick to his gut._

_"Well, if that's all you want from me, I'll be halfway to New York City 'fore sunrise." Emmett spit up blood against the brunt of the blow, shakily trying to make it to all fours. "I didn't do nothin' wrong!"_

_His mother thought of the day he was born then. The heavy rain had cooled the summer air and the breeze came in through the open window at the top floor of her beautiful white castle that was the plantation she grew up on. She was tired, and the stress of delivering twins at the young age of seventeen had left her head feeling light and her limbs feeling heavy when she reached her arms out for the both of them. She'd proudly looked at those darling dimples in his cheeks and imagined what all she'd do just to make sure he had millions of reasons to smile._

_"You ungrateful bastard." John changed his mind then and whirled around. "You know damn good and well the shit you've gotten yourself into."_

_According to John McCarty, his son was dragging his family's name through the mud being associated with people like Bonnie and Sam Sanders. He thought of the way his son's white, sun tanned hand wrapped around Bonnie Sanders's fingers that were black as night. He thought of the names they called his son - none of which had bothered Emmett, but it had gotten people talking…_

_Even though his knuckles were bleeding and the pain of some shattered fingers begged him to let it go, John McCarty was unable to bear the thought of being alone with his thoughts so he grabbed his son by the collar and ripped him to his feet._

_"After all I've given you. A roof over your goddamn head. Food to fill your goddamn belly." His dark eyes looked black as he fixed them on the son that had disappointed him and embarrassed him yet again._

_"All you ever gave me was the back'a your hand." Emmett shot back, not truly meaning what he said, but he knew it would hit his father where it hurt if he did._

_John McCarty reared back to land one last punch, hoping it'd knock some sense into his wayward teen._

_It landed and finally broke Emmett's nose._

_"God fucking damn it." Emmett gasped, his hands coming up to the fresh blood and pain._

_"Watch your mouth in front of your mother." John snapped. "Get up, you worthless piece of trash."_

_Emmett dropped his hands from his nose that poured with blood, not even bothering to guard his face anymore._

_"You can hit harder than that." Emmett spat at his feet, smiling smugly up at him._

_John McCarty's eyes were crazed at the challenge, and for a moment he thought he could kill Emmett._

_The look in Emmett's eyes made it almost seem he wanted him to - put him out of his misery._

_Seeing what her husband had made of her son broke Helen McCarty's heart. But it was more than the bruises and blood that disheartened her._

_It was the look in his eyes. He was the prey, but he was stubborn. He was the hunted, but he was fighting back. He was always on edge, wondering when the next punch would land. He was always on guard. He didn't sleep soundly. He didn't rest._

_But, he defiantly refused to live in fear so he lived in distrust._

_"Emmett, for the last time… stop it!" Helen begged him because she wouldn't dare beg her husband._

_John panted heavy breaths over his defiant son, lunging for Emmett and grabbing his collar, holding him up on his toes._

_After that damn war, John McCarty had plenty of friends - the ones that lived anyway - that had fancy doctors telling them that they had wounded minds. Usually, shell shock was reserved for the weak and attributed to the failings of a coward._

_John McCarty wasn't a coward, and he didn't go see any of those hoity-toity city doctors. He didn't need to._

_He'd prove he wasn't weak._

_He was nineteen years old when we was shipped out. He left a wife and two kids at home. One was on the way that he hoped was another boy. His pride and joy was his son, even though there was a shred of him that imagined if it was a girl he'd never have to worry about her getting shipped off to some foreign country and dying millions of miles from home._

_This was the war to end all wars though, and when that dull explosion hit and the poison gas crept in strangling the men beside him, he thought about the sacrifice he was making so that little boy'd never have to know any of this._

_In the present, his son coughed on some blood, and it spilled down the front of his shirt._

_The red of it pulled John's focus._

_John McCarty felt his son's body getting heavier and heavier in his hands as he started to slip away. Emmett's dark eyes were having trouble focusing, but his father's mirrored eyes found the depths of them._

_John's ears rang with the sound of bullets, and he held together all the displaced parts of Robby Graziano, a thirteen year old boy that had snuck into the war and around the age barrier at the recruitment offices because he'd been a healthy and tall enough boy that they let him pass for sixteen._

_Emmett was thirteen now…_

_Robby Graziano had been blown to pieces._

_At thirteen._

_"Stand up." John ordered urgently, yanking his boy back to his feet._

_He needed to see Emmett wasn't in pieces._

_John saw his boy was in one piece and he exhaled, frowning as he transported back and forth between the past and the present._

_Emmett smiled smugly up at him._

_John released his grip on Emmett's collar and Emmett sunk back and away from him._

_Emmett turned over his shoulder and watched his father walk out the front door without a word, slamming it behind him. Emmett didn't know where he went when he ran off outside, but he'd stay gone for a little while._

_He always did._

_"Are you okay?" Helen asked, finally without worry of pride, Emmett slumped in an exhale._

_Helen reached out to catch him under his arms to steady him, but Emmett couldn't get his feet under him again no matter how hard he tried._

_"I didn't do nothin wrong, Mama." Emmett said, blood bubbling in his mouth. "Honest."_

_"Emmett." She scolded, her eyes full of fear._

_She hadn't known what this was about, but she didn't want to. It made it easier that way._

_She assumed Emmett really had done something wrong, even though she knew nothing he could've ever done would've warranted being subjected to something so violent._

_Even though Emmett didn't act like it in many ways, he was still a child._

_He was just a child…_

_John McCarty would accidentally kill him one of these days because Emmett'd sooner be killed than admit he did something wrong when he didn't believe it._

_Why couldn't he just take it and keep his mouth shut? It'd be over faster that way._

_Of all the lessons, she hoped he'd learn._

_"Mama, I swear." Emmett's big brown eyes darted over her face in some sort of pleading._

_"Don't swear. It's immoral." She worried nervously as he ducked his forehead back down to her shoulder._

_She felt his weight as he exhaled._

_"You said God sees ev'rythin. And He saw them yellow bellied bullies pickin' on Bonnie Sanders. She's just a lil girl, littler than Molly." He breathed shakily, getting weaker by the second, but he found it necessary to make sure his mother saw the sincerity in his eyes. "Her mama'd made her a new coat and they popped the buttons off it and ripped it off 'er…"_

_Emmett got a chill down to his bone, hatred making the blood in his mouth taste sweet as honeysuckle._

_"Emmett." She clenched her jaw, feeling his shaky breath as she practically held him up on his feet._

_She knew where this was going._

_"I was standin' right there… God saw n' he didn't do nothin so I… I thought…" Emmett went on._

_She got a good look at the way Emmett looked at her with a frown, knowing it came from his anger at God… His anger at his father… His anger at her._

_Helen McCarty had been caught between two worlds for years. She'd had babies one after the other after the other for over a decade, and she was worn out. The women in town talked about her with pity, whispering behind her back and behind her children's backs. People always said there was one baby on her and one baby in her, but that wasn't even the hard part. The hard part was watching her children die one after the other after the other._

_She'd been having babies, but she'd been grieving for over a decade, having buried so many of them… Her depression made her stay still for long periods of time, sitting on the front porch but never feeling the sun on her face._

_And now, she had a child, living and breathing in front of her that needed her, but his voice sounded like she was hearing it from underwater._

_"I didn't do nothin' wrong, Mama." Emmett repeated and this time, it was a choked whisper._

_It seemed important to him to absolve himself to her._

_"I know, baby." Helen McCarty finally agreed, knowing exactly what this was about now. She didn't need to hear anymore._

_She sighed, bending down to kiss his messy black hair to hide some of her tears in it._

_"Well, Daddy don't." Emmett's voice cracked an octave._

_"It's all right." Helen nodded, nervous to be crossing her husband, but something deep in her soul softened at the sound of her baby boy's voice cracking. "He don't know the Lord like you do."_

_He was becoming a man without any idea how to, but he was doing just fine. He'd be all right. He knew what it was like to believe in something… to fight for something._

_Emmett had the strongest sense of self Helen McCarty had ever seen. She wondered how at such a young age, he knew exactly who he was and who he wanted to be. He knew exactly what he believed, and he did so with the deepest conviction. Helen had to turn away from him then or she'd get scared._

_She was always scared to love and lose…_

_It happened too often and she couldn't bear to lose Emmett, so she tried her hardest not to love him._

_But it was impossible. He was so easy to love…_

_"I've got it, Mama." Dorothy came in as she always did with a bucket of water and a wash cloth, avoiding looking at Emmett directly._

_She wasn't squeamish. She couldn't afford to be in this family._

_But, she had hidden throughout the duration of it, trying to keep the other girls from crying and carrying on. They worried for him, for themselves… Dorothy felt guilty as she heard what she could only imagine as the worst beating Emmett had ever gotten, she was glad it wasn't her._

_They all did._

_Dorothy wondered why Emmett let it go on. She wondered why he always stood back up. Why couldn't he just say he learnt his lesson and let it finish after a couple good hits?_

_It wasn't even any of his business what those boys were doing picking on Bonnie Sanders like that. Why'd he have to step in and start that fight in the first place? Why'd he have to punch a cop's son square in the face? Why'd he have to walk her home?_

_"Let's get you cleaned up." Helen mumbled, winding Emmett's arm around her shoulder to guide him into the kitchen and to provide support for him to be able to walk._

_"I can stitch up his face." Dorothy offered, producing a sewing needle from her pocket and readying her stomach for this._

_There was a deep running gash along his cheek bone where he'd hit the side of the table._

_Dorothy was always prepared for the aftermath of one of her father and Emmett's bouts. She'd learned to be._

_The worst the girls had ever gotten was a busted lip, but Emmett was always in pieces afterward and needed to be sewn back together like one of their hand me down dresses._

_Everybody wondered why Emmett didn't fight back. They knew he could. Dorothy and Elizabeth'd seen him fight in town a few times. He wasn't angry or bitter and he didn't pick any fights. He just finished them. He was a good fighter. With their father, sometimes Emmett guarded his face or dodged, but most of the time he just took the hit with a smug smile._

_Helen didn't say a word as she sat Emmett at the kitchen table, but she saw his bad ear was bleeding._

_"How's your trick ear, Em?" Dorothy asked him for her as Helen handed him a wash rag._

_He'd lost most of his hearing in his right ear from an infection in 1926. He wouldn't have gotten that infection if he hadn't fallen in that frozen creek trying to rescue Molly's damn cat out of that old tree. He was a sucker for little Molly and those big blue eyes._

_He'd do anything for her, so when she wanted that cat down out of that tree, why of course Emmett climbed up for it._

_Helen stepped back and removed herself by pretending she was busy in the kitchen._

_"How's that?" Emmett narrowed his eyes, but his dimples showed so Dorothy knew he was joking and she sighed._

_"Drink." Dorothy commanded, handing the last of the whiskey to Emmett knowing one of them would get a black eye for it later when their father found it was missing if they didn't convince him he'd drunk it himself._

_But right now, Emmett needed it for the pain._

_Emmett wouldn't dare wince at the open gashes in his mouth as the alcohol burned through his jaw. The taste of blood was prominent though and he spat out a river of it into a nearby empty can._

_"How do I look?" He smiled at Dorothy, blood still staining his teeth._

_None of the important ones had been knocked out. Thank God._

_"Well, you're no uglier than usual." Dorothy teased._

_"We're twins, Dotty." Emmett laughed, but regretted it at the pain in his side._

_He coughed again, a gasping cough and Dorothy tried not to be worried._

_Helen McCarty kept her hands busy preparing some soup, but she looked back at her two firstborns with tired wistfulness and a tinge of fear before she lowered her hands to cradle her newly rounded center once again…_

_All these children…_

_"Damn, you got me there." Dorothy rolled her eyes, sitting in the chair beside him and scooting the lantern forward so she could get a good look at that gash on his cheek. "Emmett, I'm…"_

_Emmett smiled, completely forgetting about all that had transpired. Dorothy didn't have to finish her sentence, but they both knew she was going to say she was sorry._

_For a second they stared at each other as only twins stare at each other._

_As Dorothy cleaned the gash on his cheek and the other cuts and scrapes littering his skin, Emmett leaned in to the dramatics, giving her a hard time on the merits of her doctoring._

_"Would you stop it?!" Dorothy's eyes widened, thinking that in his joking he was actually in pain. "I keep thinking I'm hurtin' you."_

_"Nothin' hurts me." He snickered._

_"Obviously you don't remember the last time I stitched you up." Dorothy sighed. "'Cause this is gonna hurt like a bitch."_

_"Dorothy Mary McCarty!" Helen scolded, her eyes growing wide as she regarded her daughter's foul mouth._

_On her son, she could stomach it, but on her daughter…_

_She still hoped Dorothy could marry well. She was blossoming into a beautiful young woman, and with each passing day, the possibility thrilled Helen to pieces._

_"You're gonna want to drink the rest of that whiskey." Dorothy ignored her mother and winked in Emmett's direction, trying to look confident as she threaded the needle that'd sew his face back together._

_"This is gonna leave one hell of a scar."_

_"Good." He nodded._

_And he'd wear it proudly the rest of his life for the world to see as a symbol._

—-

**Emmett: **_Temet Nosce_

_Present_

I heard my name in that angel's voice and looked up from where I'd caught my reflection in the glass table.

We were playing this new game…

Monopoly.

"You have to pay rent." Rosalie said in a soft, tender tone.

Her beautiful, perfect golden eyes darted over my face, and she gave me a little half-smile, but her gaze held concern.

"What?" I ran my hand over my left cheek then through my hair as I tried to focus.

It was so _hard_ to focus these days. I felt my energy slipping out of my fingertips…

They were making me get thirsty again to push my control and it had been a little over a week of the torture now.

Everyone else though just assumed I was easily distracted and unreliable.

"The game. You have to pay rent." Rosalie spoke softly from where she sat on my right.

My fingers absent-mindedly went to my right ear before I realized I could hear her perfectly, _more_ than perfectly.

No trick ear.

I got a sour, awful taste in my mouth as I looked down at these stupid smooth clothes Carlisle had gotten for me that were nicer than anything I'd ever had when I was _myself_.

My fingers pulled at the starched collar of my shirt, all of a sudden feeling like my tie was too tight. It felt wrong because it _was_ all wrong. This wasn't _me_. These clothes… These shoes… The way my hair'd been combed.

I ran my hands through it, ruffling it intentionally.

The outdoors called my name and I imagined flying out the door and into the Alaskan snow… Sinking my teeth into the veins of Alaskan animals… A stray hiker.

I tried to dig deep into who I was under all these instincts…

But, it was getting harder and harder instead of easier. They told me it would get _easier_. It was a lie. Every day it was harder to remember _anything _about myself as _Emmett McCarty_ because I was too filled with who I was as a vampire - a killer, a predator…

I shook my head to shake the thoughts but it was no use.

My mind was a tangle of confusion between all the new information I was taking in, my instincts, and blurry human memories that reminded me I had a life before all this.

I was _Emmett McCarty_ before all this.

I had lived and learned before all this.

I had experiences and real tangible reactions to them before all this.

Right?

I felt disjointed, like a bunch of misfit pieces.

"Oh gee, sorry. How much do I owe ya?" I asked her trying to gain some time to collect my thoughts.

"Two thousand dollars." Rosalie gave me a little, perfect smile of amusement.

She was good at this game. Incredibly strategic and smart as a whip.

"Come on, have a heart! Just gimme more time to pay will ya?! I have a family! I been savin' up for an operation in this rotten Depression! Have some mercy!" I tried to joke lightheartedly as I handed her the steep fake bills, but the mood wasn't right.

I didn't feel like joking around. It wasn't sitting well.

Still, Tanya and Kate found it entertaining, and their harmonic laughter mixed in with Edward's snort of amusement.

I felt Rosalie's eyes on me, and self-consciously ran my hand over my face again.

I was unsettled, like a lit fuse ready to blow.

My eyes darted east.

The door opened on the other side of the house as I'd sensed. Carlisle and Esme were back from hunting.

The fresh air awakened my deadened senses and I turned at my fastest speed, standing up from the table.

"Emmett! For Christ's sake! Sit down! It's your turn." Tanya called after me with a laugh, but she sounded a million miles away.

The snow outside masked the smell of blood.

Blood.

More Blood.

The faint smell of it on their clothes was enough to drive me wild.

"This game is never going to end." Irina sighed exasperatedly, this not being the first time I had been too distracted to play a game.

"Emmett, come on." Edward called, his voice firm and direct. "Sit back down."

I shook my head to shake the thoughts and caught the glorious smell of roses and honey…

Rosalie exhaled as I sat back down next to her.

And _lavender_…

"You dropped this." Rosalie said quietly, handing me a tiny green house game piece.

I stared at it for a long moment, the way it looked on her snowy fingertips, a house.

A home.

"Thanks." I opened my hand, palm toward the ceiling, and as she placed the piece in it, her fingertips lingered on mine in a way that transcended normalcy. She spread her dainty hand atop mine, the only thing between our two palms being that tiny green house.

Our palms domed around it so as not to crush it, but we were touching and electricity coursed through my body, my missing energy immediately being refilled. She slid her hand just slightly to the left over mine and ever so slightly bent her fingers as if they'd thread through mine.

I might've just imagined it, but I knew I hadn't when I looked up into her eyes.

It was the faintest look in her eyes that hoped…

That finally opened the gates and gave me permission…

The simple contact between us was enough to tether my attention, and I began to bend my fingers around hers too.

She'd asked me to with her eyes. I was certain of it, now.

"You are the _worst_ to play games with." Irina complained. "Roll the dice will you?"

Rosalie retracted her hand and returned it to her lap so quickly that I thought I'd hallucinated the whole thing. The only way I knew I hadn't was the tingling, burning sensation on my skin and the tiny green house left over in my palm.

"Oh, gee, sorry." I reached for the dice.

Rosalie kept her eyes down and away from me, but there was the lightest of smiles on her perfect, beautiful lips.

She looked exceptionally pretty this afternoon. She wore a violet purple dress with gold buttons that only hoped to be half as golden as her hair. Her hair was pulled up off her gorgeous swan's neck and twisted up in a way that made her amber eyes sparkle.

My eyes lingered on Rosalie's neck, the long, slender shape of it, her porcelain skin, the velvet way she'd feel under my lips.

I thought of the human veins there that I'd sunk my teeth into. The pulsing, hot…

"Emmett?" Rosalie pulled me from my reverie.

I rolled the dice.

It was becoming blatantly obvious to everyone that I had no hope of productively playing this game anymore.

I was too far gone.

Carlisle's footsteps were getting louder and louder.

"I think we should call it." Edward suggested, realizing my thought was right. "We've been playing for hours and we're not getting anywhere."

"You're just saying that because you aren't winning." Tanya winked at him in teasing.

Edward grinned.

"Rosalie comes by it honest." Edward said in apparent teasing.

She frowned then, deeply.

"What do you mean?" Kate asked, leaning forward on her elbows as she sat across from me.

She was charismatic and easy in conversation, asking with honest curiosity.

"My father was… well, he worked, _works_ in investments and…"

"_Money_." I finished her sentence, thinking about her fancy life in New York and how her father would've thought I was nothing but a common crumb unworthy of his little girl.

**_1926_**

_"Kids, get your asses in that field if y'all wanna eat this winter. We got horn worms." John McCarty called in a booming shout._

_"But what about school?" Elizabeth McCarty panicked, looking over at her father with pleading wide eyes. "Miss Walton said she might put my story in a contest!"_

_Emmett already had been up in the field working for hours before they'd gotten up. It could be seen in the sheen of sweat on his tanned skin and the tired look in his eyes that looked misplaced for youth. Emmett'd gotten pulled out of school last fall to work the field. Dorothy'd opted to stay home too and help their Mama with keeping the house._

_Now, Dorothy untied her apron and grabbed a bucket. _

_ Elizabeth clutched her school book to her chest. She knew she was next to get pulled out. _

_She really didn't want to be._

_Emmett hadn't really liked school. He had trouble with getting his letters jumbled up when he was reading, but more than that, he had trouble sitting still to learn. Because of this, it hadn't been too bad when they'd pulled him out of school to work outside. His eyes lingered as his friends waved when they passed by on their walks to and from school while he worked himself to the bone, but overall he wasn't bitter about it. _

_Dorothy stayed home because Helen McCarty was having so many babies and she needed Dorothy to be a mama too. Dorothy liked being a mama. _

_On the other hand, Elizabeth _loved _school. She swore she was going to go to college just like Miss Walton. She had to. _

_She had to get out of here._

_"You think you're too good for us?" John McCarty narrowed his eyes, challenging her._

_"No, Daddy." Elizabeth breathed, her knobby knees shaking in her hole-filled boots as she put her book down on the front porch and picked up a bucket._

_"You think yer so special." He went on. "But ye aint too special to starve this winter when these bugs eat up all our money." _

_"I'll do double if she can go do her readin' today." Emmett said, keeping his head down as he proposed this to his father, wondering if he was just going to get popped in the mouth for being defiant. "An' I won't take no supper." _

_John McCarty hated to be undermined, but Elizabeth's eyes were already welling up with tears and her bottom lip trembled in wanting._

_He snorted, dismissing his daughter with the wave of his hand before he started over to Emmett and smacked him in the mouth with a quick slap of the back of his hand just as Emmett had expected he would. _

_He had time to brace himself._

_"Don't question me, boy." John McCarty threatened, grabbing his son's face harshly to look into the mirror image of his own eyes. _

_"Yes sir." Emmett just nodded then and shot a little smile over to Elizabeth as she traded her bucket for her book once again._

I had to make something of myself before I'd ever be able to stand next to someone like Rosalie.

My hand absently ran over my cheek.

It was easy to be distant from her when I was too insane with thirst. Too wild… But when it all faded, as I'd been promised it would, what would keep her from me?

_Then, _it would just be me… I would be to blame. Who I am… Even who I _could be_ couldn't depart that much from who I was…

Poor, uneducated, worthless trash.

"Money." Rosalie emphasized in what sounded like shame.

The way her lips curled around the word made me think she resented it.

I grew up thinking if I had a dollar, all my problems would be solved. I looked deep into Rosalie's face, wondering what was going on in her mind and what always went through it.

I wanted to know everything.

"So where are you from, Rosalie?" Tanya asked her.

"New York." Rosalie answered with a nod, signaling that she didn't want to talk about herself anymore.

"And what about you, Emmett?" Kate propped her chin in her hands. "You've got an accent."

"The middle of nowhere, Tennessee." I snorted realizing in context just how contrasting the two of us truly were. "So I come by my accent and Southern charm honest."

Kate snickered.

"And y'all? You got a little accent yourself." I raised an eyebrow, my hand coming to my newly perfect right ear that heard every detail of those accents.

The three of them looked at one another.

"Well, it was before there were modern national borders, so somewhere near Slovakia, Hungary, area." Irina answered with a shrug.

"Uh,_ where_?" I chuckled.

"Eastern Europe." Kate answered easily. "We were all born around the 11th century so things were a bit different back then."

"And I thought _Carlisle_ was old." I teased her and she kicked my shin under the table as she made a face and laughed.

"How's it going in here?" Carlisle began, standing behind us now as he returned from his hunt. "I heard my name."

He put a hand on my shoulder and I slowly shrugged him off.

His breath smelled like blood and it enraged me so I tensed up.

His smile was pleasant, but it flickered as I turned to look at him.

Apparently the look on my face was half as ravenous as I felt.

"Emmett was just calling you old." Tanya joked around easily with Carlisle, drawing away from the awkward.

"Well, _you're_ even older." Carlisle teased back and I didn't know he'd had it in him.

I snickered lightly.

Carlisle tried to give me a smile, but avoided looking directly at me.

Carlisle had avoided my eyes for this entire trip, and kept conversation with me at the surface. I had disappointed my father enough times to know I'd disappointed Carlisle.

But, this was different somehow.

Carlisle wasn't _angry with me_…

In fact, I wondered if Carlisle had _ever_ been angry about anything.

Something dark in me longed to push him just because I could, just because I wanted to see how far I could push him before he'd crack and prove he was just the same…

Another, bigger part just wanted to hunt and to do that, I'd have to get past him…

"How did you all come to be together?" Rosalie asked as if she knew I needed distracting as Carlisle turned back toward a conversation with Esme, Carmen, and Eleazar.

"The same as you I suppose - chance, right place - right time." Kate shrugged.

Rosalie's eyes darted down. I knew she thought the opposite.

Wrong place - wrong time…

I saw it in her eyes.

I wondered if I could do anything to stop those thoughts.

I wanted to reach out and touch her perfect face.

"Or in my case,_ wrong_ time." Kate narrowed her eyes at Tanya and stuck out her tongue like my little sisters did in harmless teasing. "Tanya attacked my people one night. See, I was a… well, I guess you'd call it a _body guard_, for a highborn in our Slavic tribe. We were at war then, so I wasn't surprised by the screaming, until I saw it was Tanya _feeding_. _Then_, I was really surprised. I had no idea what she was, or what I would become. I was changed that night because I was too stupid to know I couldn't fight her and win."

"You _still_ couldn't fight me and win." Tanya smiled affectionately, draping her arm around Kate's shoulder and kissing her on her snowy, perfect cheek. "I was impressed with your loyalty. I knew you'd be a good sister."

Kate must've given her a little zap because she started giggling as Tanya flinched away lightly.

"We found Irina on a farm, and thought she looked like us so we got her too." Tanya shrugged, not imagining needing more reason than that.

"And why'd y'all stop hunting humans?" I fixated on that detail from the story, venom pooling in my mouth just thinking about it.

Again, the sisters giggled and exchanged a look.

I didn't understand.

Edward kept his eyes lowered and his face was whiter than usual.

"It's a bit of a story." Kate winked.

I imagined there was a lot to this story, and not just a bit.

"Have you heard of the legend of the succubus?" Tanya asked evenly.

"The who?" I swore they didn't speak English sometimes.

Irina sighed, rolling her eyes, but not at me.

"A female demon that lures men into her bed to kill them." Kate said, confidently staring right in my eyes as she said it.

I wasn't sure I'd heard her right, but I knew I didn't make that up. I wasn't that creative.

"Can't say I've heard that one before." I snorted.

Rosalie's eyes were wide as saucers and she didn't look away from Kate, but Edward looked like he was going to be sick as he kept his gaze down at his knees.

Poor old sport.

"Well, eventually, that got old. The killing part that is." Kate wanted to make sure I fully understood her innuendo. "So we decided we'd rather hunt animals than men - as _food that is." _

She kept her double meanings parallel and witty.

"We imagined that we could avoid slaughtering these men we had begun to fancy if we were well-fed on animal blood. Plus, it makes the fun part more fun when they aren't a corpse you have to dispose of afterward." Irina added with a giggle.

I couldn't believe my own ears.

They were breakable and flimsy and… _blood_.

"You… neck… with _humans_?" I was incredulous. "_How_?!"

"Surely you know _how_." Kate leaned forward on her elbows and she lowered her eyes and her voice in a way I was mighty familiar with.

That wasn't at all what I meant, but gosh darn did she cleverly turn it around on me so that I felt an amused smile widen on my cheeks.

"But, you haven't had centuries of practice so…" She sighed a breathy sigh out of her heart shaped lips.

I let out an unbridled laugh, responding to her challenge with amusement because my head was spinning in circles and I couldn't think to do anything else.

Kate was _dangerously_ flirtatious, but I didn't take it personally. She was a chronically flirtatious dame. It wasn't directed at me in particular, just my maleness.

Nonetheless, I played into it.

Rosalie pushed away from the table then, her chair scraping against the ground cacophonously.

"Excuse me." Rosalie murmured breathlessly and nervously.

My eyes followed her, and Edward stood up to follow her into the other room, his eyes staying low. His wish to be invisible was heard loud and clear, but Rosalie could never be invisible.

She was too beautiful.

I took a long, lingering look at Rosalie's back, trying to keep my thoughts pure, but it was pretty damn hard. And, I was already distracted.

"American girls are so _uptight_ about sex." Kate winked in my direction, obviously referencing how Rosalie couldn't stomach the conversation.

Kate spoke this too loudly for it to have been intended as a secret. Rosalie heard what she said.

I immediately regretted speaking so crudely in front of her. She was a lady, the _real_ lady type with manners and standards and… I didn't really think these things through.

"American girls… and _Edward_." Irina added with a giggle.

This I would've normally laughed my ass off at, but I couldn't find it in me.

"Do you think she's all right?" I asked, my dead heart feeling like it was thumping in my chest.

I didn't realize I'd risen from the table until I was already on my feet.

"I'm sure her pristine standards for ladylike and appropriate conversation are left in tact." Kate suggested with a shrug, alluding to Rosalie's perceived pretentiousness. "She's fine."

I frowned, darting my eyes toward where she and Edward had disappeared. For how much I gathered they annoyed the hell out of one another, they certainly seemed more evenly matched than she and I.

**_1923_**

_"My name's Edie." Edith Greene preferred to be called Edie because she felt it suited her better. "Nicetomeetcha."_

_She was full of spunk and personality which left her mother worried she'd never grow up proper. There wasn't much hope for that in a town this poor anyway._

_Emmett McCarty's grin lit up his face like late summer lightning bugs. _

An image of Edie Greene popped in my head to remind me of the first gal I'd ever fancied. We were just kids at nine and seven. I'd dropped out of school that year to work the land, but she'd still walk by and wave to me on her way to town. She wore that pretty blue dress with the flowers and her long red hair pulled into braids with her grandmother's ribbon. Edie was smart and told me all sorts of things they'd learn in school. I taught her how to catch a frog at the creek and climb a tree.

My mind couldn't precisely conjure the freckles on her nose, or the name of her little brother, but more than all the details, I'd completely forgotten how I felt it in my gut when I kissed her.

I forgot how it _all_ felt.

"Let's play Charades now since it's even teams and there are no mind readers in the room." Irina suggested.

I didn't have to be a genius to know that the reason we were playing so many games was everyone was trying to help distract me from wanting to hunt.

Blood.

It came to the forefront of my mind again, ripping through my thoughts like a steam train.

I knew it couldn't happen now that I was a vampire, but I imagined it was getting hotter and hotter to an unbearable degree as I sat down.

"All right! That sounds swell." Tanya grinned.

I focused on Kate's face to keep from being distracted by blood and Rosalie and Edward and a rampant identity crisis, but it was a very difficult feat even considering Kate's impossible beauty.

I let my eyes trace over the bow of her bottom lip, focusing on the details of her features to avoid thinking about…. _blood_.

But even amidst my instinctual distraction, Rosalie infiltrated my thoughts.

Her presence in my thoughts was scalding hot, and when I heard her musical laughter from the other room at something clever Edward had said, I could've screamed. I tried unsuccessfully to focus on the charades, noticing I'd angrily gripped the side of the table too tightly so the glass cracked.

**1934**

_Dolly Reed exhaled out of the high, her fingers curling into Emmett McCarty's black hair as she pulled his face down to kiss her. _

_He smiled against her mouth, having a special liking for the softness of women in a world as hard as his. _

_Emmett was thirteen and a half years old when he first experienced the magic of a woman. He thought it magic because he couldn't believe that women, being as strong as they are, were also so… so tender. _

_Now, at nineteen, he was still taken aback by the unbelievable secret softness of a woman. However, now they were older it came with more expectations, and Dolly Reed, a preacher's daughter would be expecting marriage from him. _

_He sat back against the headboard, lighting up a cigarette for his nerves._

_"It's raining." Dolly said with a smile, lying her head on his chest and feeling so safe in his arms. _

_The sound on the tin roof was enough to quiet even her busy mind._

_He nodded, running his fingers through her honey colored hair that was long enough she sat on it in between hymns at church. _

_"I been prayin' for rain for ya, Em." She kissed his neck, knowing he was weighted by the drought this summer that'd left the top leaves scorched and the crops suffering. "I ask God every day to…"_

_"You know I hate you talkin bout bible beatin' in bed." Emmett said in a cloud of smoke. _

_His voice was even and removed because he didn't care enough to argue with her about it, honestly. _

_But the drought wasn't all that weighted him. His sister Elizabeth was supposed to get married today, but instead… it had been her funeral. _

_Beth'd taken ill and it hit her fast. The fever burned through her and left her ice cold within three days. The man that would've been her husband, Jack Griffin, cried like Dolly'd never heard a man cry today as Emmett and Sam Sanders lowered her coffin into the ground. _

_Dolly'd stood there next to her father, hearing him say all those comforting words he always said at funerals. _

_But, she watched Emmett. _

_He had a black eye and busted lip as he always seemed to , and something about that had always drawn her to him since they were just kids. Emmett McCarty wasn't a rightful subject for pity by any means, but he'd been beaten and battered for as long as Dolly could remember. She thought she could take care of him. _

_But, he'd rather die than let her do that._

"Emmett, you have to _guess_." Kate sighed exasperatedly, standing in the center of the room where she'd been acting and I had yet to guess a word. "That's how charades work."

"Sorry." I ran a hand through my hair, then absent-mindedly over my right ear.

Tanya, Kate, and Irina watched me and waited.

It had been hours and hours of this, but it felt more like drawn out centuries.

"It's never going to be easy, but it'll get _easier_." Tanya said, her tone shifting to talk to me interpersonally.

"You'll be able to control it so much that sometimes you don't even have to think about it." Kate added with a nod.

"You'll _always_ want blood, but living on _animal_ blood does allow us to… experience life more like a human too." Irina added. "We can _feel _more human."

"And that's a _good_ thing?" I mumbled, not entirely convinced.

Humanity meant pain. Humanity meant hunger. Humanity meant vulnerability.

But, I couldn't remember anything about who I was all of a sudden. All I could think of was ripping those men apart piece by piece.

"Well, _we_ certainly think so. On our diet, we can… find _family_ and feel a part of something, like we _belong_. The further you get from humanity, the more centuries that pass by hunting humans - you start to forget._" _Irina tilted her head to the side.

"You start to _forget_ to value human emotions and experiences like family, or New Year's Eve, or… I don't know… playing games and laughing with people, because all you live for is the hunt. You start to forget what it's like to live with purpose beyond survival… There's a real distinction between _instinct_… and human emotion." Kate added onto her sister.

"_Emotions_? _That's_ why I shouldn't hunt humans?" I tried to be serious but I couldn't, and I laughed.

"You don't understand, but you will." Kate rolled her eyes.

I snorted.

Even though it was philosophical and far fetched, it made sense.

How could I connect with anyone else if I couldn't even connect with myself? I had no tangible connection point between who I was or who I am _now_. Who was Emmett McCarty _at all_? Did he even exist? My mind and body were on separate radio frequencies, and I felt so disjointed I doubted my own name.

Again my fingers traced over where the scar on my face would've been. The skin was perfectly smooth and it was like that day had never truly happened.

Neither had twenty years of other days like that…

I had to hunt. Even animal blood would do at this point.

I jolted to my feet to go find Carlisle.

The sound of the piano got louder and louder as I finally stood on the outskirts of the room where Carlisle and Esme were sitting and enjoying Rosalie playing some fancy classical piano song. Edward sat next to her on the bench and he watched her play.

"Watch the crescendo to the high D." Edward instructed with foresight, then her fingers knotted on the keys and fell in a crash of sound.

She growled angrily, something I'd never seen her do and she pushed away from the piano.

She didn't know I was watching her.

"Rosalie, you can finish the movement." Edward suggested lightly. "Try again."

"No, I quit." Rosalie remained strong against his convincing.

"I want to be perfect…or _nothing_." Rosalie murmured almost inaudibly as she ripped her fingers off the piano keys like they were scalding hot.

**1922**

_"All right, Emmett let's get this over with." Miss Walton sighed, absolutely at her wit's end with the McCarty children, and only two of them were old enough for school. _

_By the way the town talked about Helen and John McCarty, there were going to be another dozen or so of those ragamuffin kids that Miss Walton'd have to teach. _

_Emmett grinned apologetically to her, three of his teeth newly missing at age seven. He didn't much like school or Miss Walton for that matter, but he did feel bad that he misbehaved and he admitted he deserved the wrath of her ruler. _

_"Hold out your hands." She instructed him, but as he did so and Miss Walton got a good look at the burns on his palms and the bruises on his fingers and wrists, she paused._

_She couldn't bear to strike him._

_"Why don't you run along and play?" Miss Walton suggested in a deep swallow of dread._

_"But Miss Walton, I called Lee Trent a yellow bellied sour pickle." Emmett confessed._

_"You won't do it again, will you?" Miss Walton still had a knot in her stomach, but gave him a little smile. _

_"I don't know 'bout that." He responded in utter honesty._

_"Well, could you at least try to be better?" Miss Walton couldn't help but giggle a little. _

_"I'll try." Emmett agreed with a nod._

"Join us." Edward offered, not turning around, but I knew he was talking to me.

Rosalie's shoulders tensed and she didn't turn around either as I entered the room then.

"That was beautiful." I tried to awkwardly compliment.

I think I meant her piano playing, but I think I also meant her anger, the way she fumed.

The way she didn't think…

"No, it wasn't." She argued, turning now to cross her arms over her chest, but she kept her eyes away from me.

"Well, I don't know much 'bout piano, but I liked it." I tried again with a little smile, but her iciness didn't melt.

"Precisely. You _don't_ know." Rosalie's words cracked like a whip and the sharpness of them reminded me why I was here in the first place.

**1935**

_"You ain't worth a damn you know that?" John McCarty growled in time with the thunder, grabbing Emmett's collar. He could smell the alcohol on his son's breath and see its cloud in his eyes. _

_"I know. I know." Emmett slurred, stumbling out of his father's grip on his collar and swiping his hand to swat him away. _

_"You think you're so tough…" John slapped his son's cheek not near as hard as he really wanted to, but Emmett's reaction time was slow and he just tumbled down to the mud. _

_Emmett drunkenly tried to scramble to his feet. _

_Right when he got his bearings, he slipped once again with a plop. _

_This amused him, and he laughed a throaty laugh, lying flat on his back now in the mud._

_"Get up you goddamned drunk!" John screamed, half worried Emmett'd drown in the rain. _

_John grabbed Emmett's arm, yanking him to his feet. _

_Emmett's head was spinning but it was hard to tell if it was from years of improperly healed concussions, his current drunkenness, or the fact he'd just buried his eight year old sister's body. _

_"I'm ashamed'a you." John snarled once they were again eye to eye._

_"I know." Emmett exhaled with a long blink then put his hand on his father's shoulder with a little smile. "I know."_

"Rosalie…" Esme tried to push her to soften.

I needed her to, but not right now.

My focus darted to Carlisle.

Edward stood slowly, reading my thoughts.

"Can I hunt?" I asked him.

The room fell silent.

"_Please_." I mumbled at his righteousness.

Carlisle took a deep breath.

My throat burned sorely as I swallowed.

"No." He stood his ground and it angered me. "Not yet. Four more days will make two weeks. I'll reevaluate then."

He rose from his seat but I was towering over him so I looked down into his golden eyes with a challenge.

I could stand my ground too.

"We _all_ had to thirst to get control, Emmett." Esme tried to add in comfort. She stood next to Carlisle. "It's awful now, but you'll be better for it."

I clenched my jaw, my body vibrating with _want_.

With _need_.

Everything in my mind was chaotic. I thought hunting would calm it. It had to.

"What if I don't want to be _better_ for it?" The words fell out of my mouth like clanging pots and pans. "I just want to be… _normal_."

I felt like a sorry, stupid crumb now, but the words were already out there and I couldn't regret them.

"You will." Carlisle nodded, his golden eyes burning into mine.

"_When_?" I gasped, my throat feeling like a hot branding iron was being stuck down it.

Rosalie looked away now, like I'd become too pathetic for her to even look at.

The easiest response to everything was anger.

"Soon." Carlisle promised even though he couldn't really say.

I don't know why this empty promise angered me so much, and I could've ripped his skull off his spine in this moment. Edward stood next to Carlisle in solidarity then, reading every rampant thought in my wild, messed up head.

I shook my head, not really wanting that, but I was thirsty…

_So thirsty_…

"Edward, stand down." Carlisle warned him, his eyes darting to him for a fleeting moment so I knew they had a mental conversation.

"We're not trying to challenge you, Emmett." Carlisle's voice was even and calm.

It certainly felt like it. And my instincts told me they were.

"Then, _let me hunt_." I growled.

"You need _control_." Carlisle said.

"You have to know there are great consequences to a life without control. That is a path none of us could follow you down. We will all forgive you your transgressions, but don't take advantage of this grace." He spoke the words like he'd been waiting to say them for a while and this fact sent me to a point I didn't know if I could come back from.

I felt stripped down to my skeleton and I hated feeling this way. I got immediately angry and exploded.

"What would you have had me do?" I snarled, immediately feeling like he was just talking about what I'd done to those monsters. "Those people _deserved_ to die."

"Carlisle." Rosalie's eyes darted to me and back to him rapidly as if in caution.

"That they did, but that's not what I'm talking about specifically. Loss of a moral consciousness is the greatest threat to our kind, but the second greatest threat is _exposure_." Carlisle said calmly as if to justify his righteous concern.

"Unconscious killing on such a large scale can provoke the Volturi, and I cannot allow _anyone_ to jeopardize this family with their actions…"

"Family?" I snorted.

"Yes, Emmett. This is a _family_, and we want to be a family _worth_ protecting." Carlisle pushed. "And you are a part of this family. I hope you see that I'm _protecting_ you by teaching you control."

Immediately it triggered a learned behavior deep inside of me from my human days. The things I wanted to remember… The things that made me _me_, were still long hidden away, but I found my response to father figures with ease.

"You're _not_ my father." I snarled not sure if I was convincing him, or myself.

My hands came to either side of my head trying to hold my brain together as the words tumbled out my mouth pathetically.

I felt drunk, totally out of control of my actions, my words, my thoughts…

"I know." Carlisle added in a whisper. "But I do care about you a great deal and want what's best for you."

"You just got lonely and changed a bunch of misfits into vampires. You think this makes us a _family_?!" I raved. "_It doesn't_."

The air was sucked from the room then. I couldn't control any of what was happening in me.

"You get off playing God, thinking you're all _righteous_ with all your_ rules_ and your fake family and your authority over us. Brain washing us." I narrowed my eyes. "Why do we even _listen_ to you?!"

I could see I'd hurt Carlisle, but I couldn't care yet. Like a wild animal, I continued ripping him to pieces.

"Emmett…" Carlisle reached out with an open palm.

"Spare me the father routine. I don't buy it." I went on. "And I don't need it. Especially not from you. You can't _protect_ me, and…"

"Emmett… That was _mean_." Rosalie interrupted and looked at me with wide eyes, apparently incredulous at just how awful I could be.

But, she didn't even know the half of it. An awful sour taste lingered in my mouth off those words.

"What? You've cornered the market on meanness?"

As I shot back at her for the first time, I couldn't even find it in me to regret it.

She gasped in her throat.

"Carlisle didn't deserve that." Rosalie stood up to me, which threw me for a loop. "And neither did I."

"I _won't _feel bad for what I did, Rosalie.…" I groaned, feeling like she'd betrayed me after what she'd said about not trusting him herself.

"No one's asking you to do that." Rosalie spoke tightly through her teeth, her eyes burning into mine as she stepped forward, standing right under my punishing glare.

"You're still asking too much of me." I growled at her, closing the gap with a step forward in her direction.

She didn't step back under the blaze of my rage, and I saw in her eyes then that she wasn't retreating.

My stomach dropped in anticipation.

"Is it asking too much of your hunting lifestyle, or is it asking too much to expect you to _be who I think you are_?" Rosalie said something that wounded me to my core in one swift blow.

Her eyes saw down to my depths, reaching in and pulling something out I had thought was dead. I'd been jolted back into myself with a strike of electricity.

Lightning was coursing through my veins until it stopped and left my body with an emptiness like it had never known.

I melted into a puddle in front of her then. Like nothing had ever affected me before, Rosalie did, and I dropped to my knees in front of her like all the bones and structure in my body had been ripped out.

I felt boneless, brainless, bodiless, soulless…

Only then did I remember my name and remember what all that meant.

"Emmett…" Carlisle began treading softly, and I knew by the look in his eyes that I'd hurt him.

I'd hurt them all. I couldn't care yet.

His words sounded thousands of miles away as I knelt in front of Rosalie, my head bowed.

My head was pounding and I tried to focus on _anything, _but the world was spinning too fast.

"Walk with me." Rosalie breathed from where she stood over me.

I didn't immediately move or even look up to meet her eyes.

"Emmett." She said my name with extreme command of it, her golden eyes burning into mine as my gaze rose to see she'd extended her hand to me. "Walk. with. me."

My eyes locked on her perfect, porcelain fingers and the fact they were extended to me.

She knelt down to my level, eye to eye, and took my hand then.

Electricity coursed through my veins. Then, with the greatest serenity I had ever felt, she claimed my fingers by lacing hers through them.

Her skin felt like fine silk, and I immediately thought of what Carlisle had said… _Emmett, she deserves the best of you, wouldn't you agree?_

I hadn't known what that meant. I looked at her angel's face, seeing nothing but icy removal in her eyes as I stood to my feet on shaky knees.

I couldn't find any of the good parts of myself and I wondered if there ever had been any. I'd been told I was lousy, worthless, and no good so many times I thought maybe that's all I really was.

No one expected _anything_ from me in my human life because all I did was mess up.

But the way Rosalie looked at me right now made me know she saw something.

Something I didn't see in myself. Something _no one else_ saw in me.

Rosalie thought I could be something more than I was.

_A worthless nobody_.

And I was proving her wrong.

But, as I looked into her deep golden eyes now even after how much I'd hurt her, there was something new in them.

My skin tingled to the top of my skull, reminding me I existed.

"Who do you think I am?" I exhaled, almost begging her for the answers.

Maybe that's who I could be now that I wasn't Emmett McCarty.


	14. Grace

_"And, oddly enough, he needs me, too. That part worked out better than I could have hoped." - Rosalie, Eclipse, p. 165 (Stephenie Meyer)_

Quick note: Here's another doozie! I'm so SO THANKFUL for your kindness and encouragement. Thank you for your in-depth reviews and your time! It means more to me than you know and it inspires me to keep writing even as I struggle. This chapter was another really indulgent one and is full of action-packed RxEm angst as they navigate how they feel about one another amidst Emmett's disjointedness in identity and how he's going to decide to live his vampire life and what diet he'll follow. Rosalie is also really struggling because she's not used to having to care for someone or pursue their feelings in this way. She also is harboring guilt and darkness over her assault that confuses her as she begins to truly fall in love with Emmett and begin to entertain wanting some sort of physical connection to him. It makes her feel flawed and impure to consider that after what she went through she could even want love and connection with Emmett to happen and it's creating quite the predicament here in this chapter.

So I found that Emmett and Rosalie's passion for one another might have a dark side as they try to navigate these extreme emotions during vulnerable point in time, so I have quite the chapter lined up on some growing pains in their relationship, but there is quite a corner that is being turned here and it is evident.

I also really loved this sentence from Eclipse and wanted to explore why Emmett would 'NEED' Rosalie. I think his background of being a 'nobody' and being constantly told he is worthless is an interesting contrast to Rosalie's background of adoration and worship, but both are inherently damaging because both of them just need to feel _seen_. He needs Rosalie particularly in this quest for 'self' and identity within his newborn stage, but also I think he could need her to make him believe he's full of worth and purpose after a life of abuse.

Even though this is a long one, please consider leaving a review and I'll post the second section of this chapter swifter ;) Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

TW/CW: Strong language, Rosalie's reference to her assault, Abuse

* * *

**_Grace_**

_And you, you were the one I treated the worst_

_Only because you loved me the most_

_We haven't spoken in a long time_

_I think about it sometimes_

_I don't know who I was back then_

_And I hope on hope_

_I would never treat anyone like that again_

_This is the only thing I've ever had any faith in_

_Grace, I know you carry us_

_Grace, and it was such a mess_

_Grace, I don't say it enough_

_Grace, you are so loved_

_Grace, I know you carry us_

_Grace, and it was such a fucking mess_

* * *

**Rosalie**

I knew who he was.

He was warm… Like sunshine.

He was strong, but not in a way that made anyone feel inferior - rather… _secure_.

He was competitive, intensely so, and there was a fire in his eyes that was only there when he knew he deserved to win. He didn't win to defeat someone else. No one else mattered. He won for himself.

He'd always admit when he didn't know something. He didn't try to cover it up or come up with an excuse like so many people did. He had a willingness to learn.

He said curse words with familiarity and in a way that made the words all at once sound both sharply cutting and a bubble of innocent laughter.

He took up space, and not just in the physical sense. His presence was immediately felt in any room because he lived loudly, and not just in the sense of sound…

He was easily enchanted by the extraordinary within the ordinary - like forcing everyone to stop what they were doing just so he could show us an especially beautiful spider's web sparkling with morning dew. He knew that the world around us was beautiful and that we'd all just forgotten to notice.

He listened… _really_ listened when people spoke, and made sure to look in their eyes and respond with sincere interest.

He let people ramble, but he never made them feel bad about it. He might've even liked it - hearing the stream of consciousness that happened _after_ people stopped thinking so hard about what to say and just let it come out of their mouths.

He was brilliant at communicating exactly what he meant.

He was shockingly…. _neat_ to be so wild. I'd seen him take the shoes Carlisle had given him. Five pairs. I'd watched him make sure the toes of them were perfectly lined up, not a centimeter off.

He was undaunted and never found an obstacle too challenging to overcome. He dove head first into everything, and didn't acknowledge any fear.

But he hadn't been any of that for a while.

It was a slow decline, so slow I hadn't immediately noticed it - like boiling water… I didn't know until I saw the bubbles spilling over the edges.

It was a slow burn, but now it was a forest fire.

It was evident now that he was so estranged from himself that he had to ask _me_ who he was.

I didn't immediately answer him when he'd asked, but I could have. I'd never had such a clear head in all my life on that subject.

I knew _exactly_ who he was, but for the first time, it was far from his own eyes. His self-assuredness had left his gaze, and the confidence that had exuded from him in the first few weeks after his change was not even a ghost in his gait.

And… the _way_ he asked…

The desperation in his black, onyx colored eyes that he needed _me_ to tell him who he was took my breath away. Emmett asked like I was looking at him and seeing him, but when he looked at himself it was all just a blank void.

He looked like a stranger.

But not just to me, to _himself_.

It reminded me of a time when I was just a little girl and put on my mother's high heels. I'd stolen some of her rouge, mascara, and lipstick and had grand plans to parade around in front of a mirror playing dress up. I was much too young for makeup and such things, but I imagined looking beautiful with ruby red lips.

I'd been so excited, _thrilled_ even to imagine looking like a woman, but then when I looked in the mirror when I was finished… I wasn't happy. All that makeup… It looked absurd on a five year old girl, and I'd never felt more stupid…

He dropped to his knees in front of me as Atlas with the world on his shoulders.

But, Emmett had crumbled under it. Finally, it had become too much.

It seemed so _wrong _to see him that way.

He was strong… Invincible… Weightless…

He had finally been crushed though, and I wondered if it was my expectations that had crushed him…

He'd told me I expected too much… And I was so… _so_ sure he was wrong…

Then, I realized… Of course it was too much when I'd expected him to do it alone.

The night that he'd seen his father hanging in the center of his family home, the night he'd learned his family had been gutted down the center and scattered across the country, the night he'd been confronted with what I understood as the darkest thing he'd ever experienced - that night he'd asked me to help him and I didn't hear it.

I didn't see it.

I didn't see it because I was so… _so selfish_….

And, it broke my heart because… because I cared about him, but I was just so damn bad at caring about people…

I wasn't good at caring about him like he was good at caring about me.

That night he'd asked me for help, but I hadn't heard it because I was leaning on him to help _me_.

Today, I saw him… really saw him for who he was, not for who he was for me or even who I hoped he could become…

The revelation impossibly made me want to… _Touch_ him.

I'd never wanted anything like that before, but it didn't feel like an unnatural desire. I'd never felt about anything the way I felt about him, but it was also the most instinctual thing I'd ever felt.

I wanted… to touch him and not in any way departing from innocence. I just… think I wanted to be near him.

If I touched him, he'd be tangible. He'd be real.

He'd be mine; like the day I'd saved him in the woods and the days following during his transformation.

When I reached out for him on his knees in front of me, I'd been calm. In the anticipation of waiting for him to take my hand, my mind and my body remained full of ease.

My fingers tightened through his now, and I was still so serene.

The second we stepped outside, Emmett seemed to fill with an electric charge of energy. Like a slingshot pulled back with potential energy, he had been ready for this moment.

I willed myself not to pull my hand away as I noticed how beautiful he was, though now it wasn't that hard to do. Now, watching him in this moment of the infinite, I let my hand be his, and he let his be mine.

I wasn't afraid.

The crisp Alaskan autumn air swelled around our joined bodies and the breeze played in our hair.

Emmett's hand vibrated at such a high frequency it even seemed too much for my vampiric senses to handle. I wondered if he was nervous, but I soon thought that was ridiculous. Pent up energy and need for the outdoors pulsed through his veins.

I saw the thrill of it in his eyes as we swam through the snow together.

Nevertheless, our fingers remained desperately intertwined like one of us was going to float away in a gust of wind, and if one of us was getting picked up in the gale, the other would follow.

I think I liked the feeling of being tethered to him, and it was something I felt warmly radiating from our point of contact all the way through the ends of my hair and the tips of my toes.

I was filled with wonder at the way he looked running next to me, getting further and further from the others. He was alive, running wild and free and… he was _impossibly_ beautiful. It took the breath clean out of my chest as I looked over at him, unable to resist the temptation to do so.

My eyes drunk in all the details of his face, the lines of his jaw, the curves of his mouth, his round eyes and straight nose. The impossible innocence on a grown man's face…

Even now.

Though I took in the beauty of his face in the present, made perfect by vampirism, my mind trailed to the memorized details of his broken human face that day in the woods, the awestruck way he'd looked at me while I ran with him in my arms.

It made me strong enough to do the impossible then, and now that same power resided in his face...

"What is it?" Emmett caught me staring at him, and he took his hand out of mine to brush across his left cheek absent-mindedly, slowing to a walk and distancing slightly from me.

I saw the slight furrow of his brow and knew that something was troubling him. In some sort of subconscious response, he'd repeated this action a few times today. I'd noticed, and it became evident he didn't recognize the feeling of his own face.

He didn't recognize himself.

I remembered his human face had a long, jagged scar there.

"You had a scar there." I exhaled without thinking.

His black eyes darted over to mine and I felt emptied by the abruptness with which he pulled his hand from mine.

"On your left side." I told him, expanding a little though he knew exactly what I meant.

His hand came to his left cheek again absently, brushing his knuckles along his cheekbone in a swift motion.

He nodded.

My dead heart thudded in my chest with anticipation.

"And, diagonally along your right eye…" I said, and my nerves felt like they were on the outside of my body as I instinctually reached out to touch his face.

"And…" I reached out.

He didn't flinch back against my fingers tracing along his cheek bone the exact space where that scar had been the day I'd saved him.

Touching his face brought us close and neither of us dared to breathe or move in the slightest as our eyes locked into one another's.

His eyes searched my face and I felt him inhale.

He just nodded, agreeing with my observation, but something was brewing in his gaze.

"And… there." I let my thumb trace over the right corner of his bottom lip toward his chin.

His eyes stayed locked onto my face as I touched his own, and there was something so incredibly… intimate… about the moment that I shivered out of my trance of confidence.

Emmett noticed and pulled his gaze away then, reaching up to guide my hand back down beside me and away from his face, but he kept his fingers on top of mine. I let him.

But then, I realized. His hand was on top of mine to keep it down my by side and not touching his face.

"What are you doing, Rosalie?" Emmett mumbled like he was mourning.

What _was_ I doing?

God.

I was mortified.

"Come with me." I said, lacing my fingers through his again as I guided him toward the edge of a cliff I'd found when I'd gone out yesterday afternoon.

Though he wasn't enthusiastic, he followed, and I felt the way his presence displaced the air around me. I was acutely aware of him, but it didn't alarm me.

"Can we sit?" I asked, turning and giving him a little smile.

He still wore an odd expression, like I had taken him all this way just to scold him and he was braced for it.

He just nodded. No smile.

"That's fine." Emmett said evenly. "But, wait."

Immediately, he shrugged his arms out of his jacket.

He also untucked his shirt, loosened his tie enough to slip it over his head, and pushed his sleeves up in a sort of ritual of _undoing_.

I watched him undress and muss his hair to dishevel himself in a way that made him more comfortable.

And feel more like himself.

I noticed the way his shirt clung around the bands of muscles in his arms.

My stomach did a somersault and I wasn't so calm in that moment.

"Don't get your pretty dress dirty." He said under his breath as he smoothed his jacket over a space at the edge of the cliff.

He offered me a little half smile. It barely showed the dimples in his cheeks so it didn't truly warm my spirit.

Though Emmett was burdened, he still dangled his legs over the edge as he sat at the cliff like an enthusiastic child. I gracefully lowered myself to mirror his position, letting my legs freely hang over the cliff's edge too.

I could jump right off unscathed, but the vastness of the fall still made my nerves flutter as I looked down from the height of it.

"Thank you." I acknowledged his chivalry and immediately, I ducked into Emmett's side, all but forcing him to put his arm around me.

He did as I'd insisted, but his eyes trailed upward into heaven again instead of to me.

The stars were especially stunning tonight in a sky with no light pollution and they danced above us in an age old waltz.

"You don't have to do this you know." Emmett grumbled darkly.

"Do what?" I asked, frowning a little.

I felt oddly exposed.

"Be nice to me, after I was horrible to you." He said through his teeth, retracting from me.

I took a deep breath, his scent filling my lungs and clearing my senses.

I didn't have to. But, I wanted to…

"Well, I'm returning the favor." I said, trying to keep my voice even.

He snorted.

"You're not horrible." He argued weakly.

"At least not incurably." The corner of his mouth turned up a little as if he were teasing me, but he didn't play games.

He spoke candidly. I knew he honestly believed it.

I couldn't help but laugh under my breath.

"And what would be my cure?" I tested, but he wasn't truly up for flirtation.

"Well…" Emmett sighed and didn't immediately respond with a witty one-liner so I could tell he was feeling off.

"Maybe… you could be happy." He said, speaking with such shocking honestly that it made me feel extremely vulnerable under his gaze.

"Maybe." I agreed in a tiny, mousy voice that didn't sound like my own. "Maybe you could too."

I frowned, feeling dismissive of the idea that he saw how unhappy I truly was. There was no way he understood my darkness to its fullest extent. He wouldn't still be looking at me the way he was looking at me right now…

"I shouldn't have treated you bad, Rosalie. I really don't know what came over me back there." Emmett said in a monotone mumble, but not as if he were starting to apologize for his behavior, but that he was letting me know there was a disconnect in him…

He didn't know what came over him, and he acknowledged this in the sort of shock and awe he'd acknowledged the way he'd killed all those hate monsters and terrorists.

His hand absently came to his cheek again.

"I don't know what comes over me at all anymore." Emmett ran his hands through his hair.

"It gets easier." I tried to comfort him.

"That's what everyone's telling me." He sighed exasperatedly as if he thought he was being lied to.

"Tell me what you see." I requested on instinct.

"What do you mean?" He frowned.

"What do you see right now? Just give me a list." I said calmly.

He puzzled, looking away and off into the distance.

"Snow… And a tree. Twelve branches. An empty bird's nest. Third branch from the bottom on the right side." He rattled off, then his focus turned to me, his eyes calmer. "And if it wasn't me talking, I'd say the most beautiful girl in the world."

"Well, why don't _you_ say it?" I challenged with a little smile, my stomach hiccuping into my throat.

He responded, coming back into his eyes a little his own little half smile lifting up a corner of his mouth.

"Maybe I will." He said, and I watched his dimples deepen in his cheeks. "Now, why'd you?…"

Unlike him, he changed the subject.

"It's what I do when I get overwhelmed. It calms me down to look around me and say what I see. It makes it easier to get back in control…"

Emmett understood with a nod.

"I get it." He gave me a little smile as a consolation prize for trying to lighten his burdens.

He looked down towards the bottom of the cliff and I halfway thought he would jump and keep running until he reached the horizon. I noticed the pain in which he swallowed his thirst.

"Did it help?" I asked, feeling his arm tighten around my shoulders in response to something he was thinking.

"A little." He assured me. "I didn't know _you_ could get overwhelmed."

I snorted a little amused laugh, feeling a nervous twist in my stomach.

It wasn't blood lust that burdened me now. It was… more than that that overwhelmed me.

His hand reached again absently to his cheek.

"How did you get that scar?" I requested, my eyes lingering on his perfectly unbothered left cheek.

It seemed important that he remembered he had a scar there.

He looked back over me and I immediately wondered if he'd ask about mine - and not the physical ones.

"I don't remember." He lied, turning back away.

He gazed out and over the cliff and looked like a nightmare ridden child…

"Emmett… You know, I _know_." I spoke quietly, suggesting to him that he didn't have to pretend with me anymore.

"What?" He was taken aback a little, his eyes darting over my face.

Obviously he saw something in my eyes then.

"Oh." He frowned, looking back to me with a sort of… disgust and moved his arm off my back.

His reaction took me by surprise a little. I saw that in his vulnerability and thirst he got harsher, but it still confused me. He _knew_ I knew. Emmett had held me after the return from his family home as I cried about the undercurrent of violence in his house. I knew. I'd seen firsthand the bruises on his sisters. I _knew_. He'd _told_ me flat out that his father hit him. I _knew. _And he absolutely knew I knew.

I was confused.

"Then why did you ask?" He narrowed his eyes, immediately skeptical of my motivations.

"I just… I just wanted you to know you can _talk_ to me."

"There's nothing to talk about." He clenched his jaw and I could feel him getting defensive, but he wasn't angry with me.

To protect himself, he was dismissive. This I could see, obviously swimming in his black onyx eyes.

"I just thought maybe… Since your father's gone…"

"My father's dead and I'm not. Well… technically." A humorless smirk pulled at the corners of his mouth as he referenced the afterlife we currently inhabited. "That's all there is to say. We talked about it that night. He was awful, but I'm glad I didn't have to kill him. You know that. I told you that."

He was trying to keep the conversation closed, but it was like water at a weak, cracked dam. It would inevitably come rushing out.

"I shouldn't have pushed you to kill him, Emmett." I said in somewhat of an apology thinking about how much could have been saved if I hadn't thought I knew what was best for him.

"You didn't." He frowned.

"I did." I swallowed.

"No, I needed to go back and see what happened. See that my mom and my sisters got out." Emmett shrugged dismissively. "And plus, I got to kill those people. Those lousy excuses of human beings. I'm glad I went back."

Impossibly, his eyes shifted into a shade of black so dark I hadn't known it even existed.

He looked like the monster I'd damned him to be more in this moment than in the moment he'd killed them.

"But, now I'm worried about you." I blurted out. "We're all worried about you."

Emmett's focus darted to me and I watched it harden.

"Why?" He asked, genuinely wondering and not just pushing me.

"Well, Carlisle left some medical journals out in the library that I read through yesterday… There are these new medical studies about… about the long term psychological effects of child abuse."

"And what does that have to do with anything?" Emmett laughed a dark laugh, a weird expression on his face.

"Come on, Emmett, I know your father… I know he _abused_ you, and your sisters, and your mother." I said as evenly as I could, treading lightly. "And that's going to make things _complicated_ for you and…"

Emmett stiffened at the word abuse, something flickering in his eyes.

That's when it occurred to me that he hadn't thought he was abused at all.

I'd made things worse, and now I could see this was not what he thought of his father's behavior as. He'd thought of it as punishment he'd earned, and now just the thought of what it meant to be abused haunted him and haunted his father's legacy in his mind.

My words twisted in his new mind enough that doubt filled his eyes and my dead heart raced in my chest. He looked confused and overwhelmed by the thought that maybe…

Maybe I was right.

But, it was still painted in his irises now that he believed he was inherently flawed and not good enough to have had a good relationship with his father. He thought it was something he did.

Now, he was even more confused.

This was problematic.

"Don't… _Ruin_ this." Emmett gritted his teeth, warning me.

"What do you mean?" I furrowed my brow.

"I told you… Just _stop_."

"Emmett, you…" I tried again.

"Why are you even bringing this bullshit up, Rosalie?!"

"Because you… haven't been yourself and I think that's why… You saw your father's suicide and it brought up some things you…"

"I'm not myself, Rosalie because I'm not _myself_ anymore!" He tossed his hands up, obviously frustrated with me. "I'm a vampire. It has _nothing_ to do with him."

"But, Emmett…" My throat felt tight and I was nervous.

I could feel him getting heated.

"Rosalie. My father's dead. I'm not. I'm telling you, _drop_ it."

"But, I don't think you've dealt with what he did to you…" I argued, seeing his eyes light on fire. "And it's making you…"

Maybe I was just projecting… After all, who was I to say this? I hadn't dealt with what Royce did to me.

I thought I had by killing Royce, but… I hadn't dealt with anything.

Emmett's black eyes blazed angrily.

"Listen Rosalie, nothing's _making_ me do anything. I was shitty to Carlisle because his righteousness drives me up the fucking wall when he smells like blood from a hunt. I can't stand Edward's know-it-all attitude, but then I can't stand it even more that he actually _knows_ everything going on in your head and I can't even… And Esme… Well okay, Esme's all right. I can't say anything about her, but… I was an asshole to _you_ because I'm _thirsty_… I'm so goddamned thirsty and you just happened to be standing there, so I snapped at you too. There's _no other reason_ but that."

My dead heart sunk and rose quickly like when you're at the top of a ferris wheel at a carnival and you look over the edge.

I couldn't even open my mouth to speak before he began again.

I'd felt so close and enlightened like I knew exactly how to be close to him, but now, now I felt distant again…

And his voice rose to a point that made me want to retreat.

"Rosalie, I'm trying to _move forward._ And you're not letting me. I don't… I don't need you to _fix _me." He grumbled.

"The fact I was awful to you and Carlisle has nothing to do with anything my father ever was or ever did." Emmett insisted strongly. "I'm not letting any of that bullshit be the reason I do _anything_. None of that matters."

"But Emmett, it's okay if you…" I started to justify his learned responses to danger and authority.

"No! It's _not_ okay. It's worse. Because if I let myself lean on whatever my father might've done or whatever brand of a bastard he was, then it means all that bullshit _ruined_ me, and I… I don't want to be ruined. I don't want to be ruined… I'm _not_ ruined."

I felt like I'd been hit with a ton of bricks and I watched him start to disintegrate.

"I don't think you're ruined. That's not what I meant." I tried to get him to see that's not what I meant, but then I realized that's what it had sounded like… "I just thought maybe it's why you…"

"Oh, I get it now… You would rather accept that there's a _reason_ I'm such a screw up." Emmett said, his voice so full of darkness that it weighted his words to the pit of my stomach. "But, it's just _me_ Rosalie. I'm not who you thought I was when you saved me. I'm sorry for the disappointment."

Suddenly, like a splash of cold water, I was awakened and I was angry.

I wouldn't accept that I was wrong about him, and I knew I wasn't.

And, he misread what I was saying entirely.

"No. I don't believe that's true. Emmett, I think you _want_ me to tell you that you can be better." I told him, challenging his gaze. "Because you are better than just being a predator and you're better than the way you talked to Carlisle, or at least you _can_ be. And, I wanted to give you a chance to identify why you're so awful to Carlisle. "

Emmett's anger flared.

"Carlisle is _not_ my father, Rosalie!" Emmett argued with me ravenously, tossing up his hands in exasperation.

"I _know that_! He knows that too. But I don't think _you_ do. He's just trying to lead you and you aren't letting him because of your experience with your father. You're not letting him help you." I said.

"I don't _want_ him to lead me! I don't want him to help me and I don't want you diagnosing me with this bullshit because you don't understand anything!" He yelled.

"I want _blood_ for Christ's sake and they're just _humans_, Rosalie! It's what I'm _designed_ to do." His anger made dark rings seem to deepen around his eyes and his hands shook in anger as they clenched into fists.

"You _told_ me you wanted to be the man I thought you were…" I recalled an earlier conversation. "You _told_ me you wanted to be better. Was that a lie?"

Emmett exhaled exasperatedly.

"No. I mean… I… I don't know!" He groaned, shutting his eyes tightly. "I don't _know_… There's… so _much_ in my head."

Emmett put both of his hands on either side of his head, hanging his focus and closing his eyes tightly.

We paused for a moment in our argument. Impossibly, I was physically exhausted.

I crossed my arms over my chest, turning my gaze away from him as I struggled with the conflict in my mind.

Maybe this conversation should have waited until he was well fed.

He wasn't processing rationally right now.

But then again, neither was I because I should have been more careful with my words, and I shouldn't have let there be a hanging space between what I thought and what I said.

I didn't like arguing with him.

It felt so wrong…

My stomach was in knots and my limbs felt heavy.

"I need you to be better." I finally said, but there was so much left unsaid that the incompletion set us even further back.

I should have said I needed him to be better because I needed him… In this awful, dark world, I needed him… and he needed me, and we could… do this burdened existence together.

This mistake… This withholding for my selfish self preservation would cost me.

"It'll never be enough for you though." Emmett mumbled venomously, looking up at me now. "Even if I never drink human blood again, it wouldn't be enough for you."

"What are you talking about?" I narrowed my eyes.

"You have _impossible _standards for me so that when I don't meet your expectations, you can justify pushing me away." He growled at me to turn the focus around, looking straight up into my eyes.

My jaw dropped and I felt fatally wounded by his venom.

"I do_ not._" I panicked a little, wondering if what he said was true.

"You don't what? Have impossible standards or push me away?" Emmett raised an eyebrow. "'Cause either way I'd beg to differ, darlin'."

"Not drinking human blood is difficult, but it's far from impossible." I said, dismissing what he said.

I didn't miss that as we argued he got more comfortable calling me darling…

"If it's not blood it's something else." Emmett huffed, venom seeping out of his tone.

"Excuse me?" I was confused as he spoke in riddles.

"Even if I never drank human blood, even if I read every goddamned book in that goddamned library, even if I wore these stuffy clothes, even if Carlisle and I were thick as thieves, even if I said everything you wanted me to say, even if…"

"Oh my God…" I groaned exasperatedly.

"Oh my God, _what,_ Rosalie?!" Emmett played into my exasperation, stepping forward to stand over me.

I knew it was impossible to produce tears, but I felt my eyes start to burn and my bottom lip start to tremble.

I was just so… frustrated!

We started yelling over one another so nothing was making sense and our words tangled together in angry strings of fraying yarn.

"You've got to be the most difficult person I've _ever_ met." I growled, defending myself by jabbing at him.

The way he challenged me, looking down on me with fire in his eyes made me uneasy.

"Well, at least I know it." Emmett shrugged, but his eyes were strongly focused on mine like it was a jab.

"What are you saying?!" I gasped, absolutely awestruck that he'd even suggest I was difficult.

"I'm saying_ you're_ difficult! And selfish and cold and manipulative and…"

I turned over my shoulder and started to walk away from him because I was too weak to handle what his wrath revealed about my own shortcomings.

"No. No. No. Don't you walk away from me!" Emmett followed, cutting me off angrily.

I clenched my jaw, my stomach dropping to my knees as I looked up at him.

"You can't walk away from me!" He said through his teeth. "I'm not letting you."

"Well, I'm not standing here and letting you talk to me like that." I growled at him, my voice catching in my throat though I willed it to remain strong and unbothered.

"Oh, I'm not afraid of you, Rosalie." Emmett challenged and it sent a shiver down my spine.

"So what?" I snapped.

"So I'm actually going to be honest with you when you're being a pain in the ass!" Emmett roared. "Unlike everyone else that lets you get away with it."

"This isn't about me. It's about _you_. This is about you being awful to Carlisle and rejecting our diet because you haven't dealt with the issues you had with your father." I snarled.

"Oh, give me a break." Emmett rolled his eyes.

"And all the... _debauchery_... of your human years." I shot back. "You don't know how to follow rules. I mean, you were a _criminal._"

"And, what about _you_, Princess?" He challenged me, absolutely irate now, stepping forward in challenge. "What's _your_ excuse?"

His words cut like a knife, trying to challenge me into justifying my own awful treatment of everyone around me.

I clenched my teeth angrily, breathing rapidly. I was panicked, but I tried to stay cool.

It was getting more difficult with each passing second.

I felt fatally wounded.

"I see through you." Emmett insisted, believing this whole heartedly as his black eyes stayed heavy on me.

"Because _you_ asked Carlisle to change me, and you wouldn't have done that if something wasn't missing." Emmett saw straight through me and it terrified me. "You _need_ me."

I clenched my jaw and my hands into fists.

"You _arrogant bastard_!" I gasped and growled a curse word.

"Why in hell did you ask him to do it then?!" Emmett roared.

"At this point, I don't know." I snapped cruelly. "You're insufferable!"

"You know you can take all this away from me because it's _yours_ to take anyway." Emmett challenged, talking animatedly with his hands as his voice rose.

"You don't..." We tried screaming over one another, but he drowned out my voice easily.

"Start the bonfire now. Rip me to pieces and be rid of me since I'm not passing any of your tests." Emmett bowed up angrily.

"_Forget_ it!" I shrieked. "I was just trying to…"

"To make me your project?" He went in for another dark hit with his words and I felt myself flinch back away from him. "You have been trying to _fix me_ since you met me!"

"No! Would you stop it?!" I shrieked.

"Do you _regret_ it then?!" Emmett growled.

My dead heart got heavy in my chest.

I would never.

"What the hell are we even _fighting_ about any more?!" My mind was diluted as I diverted subjects. "I can't follow! I'm done. I'm going home."

We weren't talking about Carlisle… or blood… or humans…

We were talking about _us_.

And that scared me more than all of the previous subjects combined.

I turned to walk away again, but he caught me again.

"Oh don't you dare start that, I see through your cruelty, Rosalie. I do." He growled at me, pointing a finger in my face.

"You keep me aware of all the ways I fall short, all the ways I mess up, all these things about my past, my family, the human I was…" I felt his anger coming off of him in waves and it was pointed directly at me as he talked animatedly with his hands.

"You're trying to distract me." Emmett accused. "But I see you. I know what you're doing."

I shook with rage then.

"And you might've never heard this in your perfect rich girl life, but _no_. _No_, I'm not letting you take the easy way out. You can't."

"You smug son of a bitch." I growled. "Now I hate you."

"You don't hate me." Emmett challenged me.

We were arguing in circles and it scared me to have him close to me while we were fighting. I was breathing heavily, feeling physically drained by this, and he stood over me glaring down at me.

The darkness in his black eyes made me shudder.

"You just hoped I was someone else." Emmett snarled, referring to my insistence that he had reminded me of someone and that's why I changed him.

He reminded me of someone… But, he didn't know what that really meant.

I saw in Emmett's eyes his rage was masking his desperation.

"No. God, you don't… You don't get it." I gasped out the words.

"Then help me understand!" Emmett yelled desperately. "I need to understand!"

"Carlisle changed me because _you_ asked him to. And he couldn't say no to you!" Emmett accused. "He wanted to make it up to you for not letting you die. I was his peace offering to you, but I've proven unworthy now that you all know what a goddamned fuck up I turned out to be."

"Carlisle made his own decision, and that's not what's going on here." I mumbled, panicking. "You're just being awful and I was trying to..."

"You deny it and you try to blame it on my father, on my human life, on Carlisle, because you don't want to acknowledge that _**you** did this to me_!" His words cracked like a whip and left a burning, gaping gash in my heart. "And now that you see what I am... you regret it."

I couldn't find words to speak though I searched desperately for some. I was taken aback.

"I thought you were pleased..." I tested.

I looked at his face now, hating myself and shaking like a leaf.

"I_ am_ pleased. I would _like_ being a vampire if it weren't for _you_. And for the love of God, the only reason I'm thirsting to death is _you_. The reason I'm suffering is _you_. The reason I'm miserable and pent up in that house is _you_." He talked with his hands theatrically.

I clenched my jaw.

His words sliced through me angrily and I was trembling against them.

"When I leave, you could just stay here with Kate." I narrowed my eyes in challenge, hating that I'd said something so petty and stupid in response to his argument. "Since you're so _miserable_ with me."

I felt like I was going to throw up in anticipation for his response. Maybe he really would.

"Oh my God, Rosalie." He laughed humorlessly.

It drove me up the wall and anger spilled out of my mouth in words I didn't mean.

"You'd be much better suited..." I stood at my tallest, tilting up my chin to feign superior removal from the situation.

"You drive me insane." Emmett growled at me. "I'm trying _so hard_, Rosalie, but my best wouldn't even be good enough for the worst of you."

"No you aren't." I argued heatedly. "You aren't _trying_ to live on animal blood, because you already think you're going to fail!"

"This is not what this conversation is about and you know it." Emmett exhaled angrily, and growled in his breath.

I didn't know what this was about anymore at all. We were just fighting to fight.

I hated him, but I had this weird... _desire_ for him which made me hate him even more.

I snarled, trying to shake the thought of crushing my mouth on his.

"Then what the hell is this about?!" I screamed.

Emmett was steaming with anger.

"I'm doing this _for_ you. I'm thirsting _for_ you. I'm suffering _for_ you." He rephrased his statement as if this would be significant.

"I mean I saved you from your poor, miserable life that was leading _nowhere_. Your father hated you. Your mother was a coward and didn't love you enough to stand up for you. Your mother _watched_ while you got beaten and broken to pieces. She sat there and _watched_. She didn't stand up for you. No one did. You were alone as you were that day with that bear. But,_** I **saved_ you." My cruelty shot out. "What else do you want from me?"

He stared at me open mouthed.

"Oh, you can do better than that. You can be soooo much more brutal than that." Emmett stepped forward to challenge me, looking at me like no one had ever looked at me, like he knew just how awful I was.

My outer beauty wasn't enough to distract him from my inner ugliness and I could see it in his eyes.

I'd hurt him.

There was so much unsaid between us that it was heavy in the air.

He was shaking with anger, absolutely transformed into monstrousness by how I'd hurt him.

It just made me fume even more.

He'd prove he was just the same...

"Come on, don't hold back!" He screamed at me.

We screamed nonsensical things back and forth at one another, waiting for something exceptionally horrible to hurt the other person enough to make them back off. But we couldn't hear it because we were yelling over one another.

Nothing stuck in particular, but we were wearing each other down. I felt it, but I'd never show it.

"I can't do this!" He finally screamed. "I can't! I can't! Why? Godddamn it!"

He fisted his hands in his hair angrily. He shook with rage, hatred pouring out of his gaze.

"Why did you think I could do this?!" He yelled at me, on another level entirely that made my heart sink to the depths of my stomach because for a second I thought he might hit me. "I can't do this!"

"You want to hit me?! You don't scare me!" I growled up at him.

"_What_?!" He gasped in disbelief, but I still turned over my shoulder to walk away.

He screamed lethally, following me in rage.

It sent a chill down my spine. I'd never been in a confrontation like this before. It brought out the worst in me, and all I wanted to do was to hurt him to protect myself.

Every bit of my skin, _hurt_.

It was like his words had been a raging fire and had scalded me.

I looked away from him, anger burning in my chest and escaping out of the ends of my fingers in a stream of rage.

He'd hurt me and all I could think of to do was to fight back.

That's when I did the most horrible thing I had ever done, and that was saying quite a bit. It was the worst thing I could have ever thought of, and it made me the monster I always knew I was.

My defensive rage took over and I slapped Emmett's cheek with a smack before he had the chance to finish his sentence.

I was too scared to let him finish.

"You want to _hurt_ me?!" I raved, pushing against his chest.

"You can't hurt me!" I knocked my fists against him, swinging wildly.

He didn't fight back; he just looked at me, watching me swing at him.

"_Nothing_ fucking hurts me!" I slapped my own face before I smacked him again with all my rage, cursing as I'd never cursed before.

He turned at the force of the blow, but of course he wasn't hurt. My hand was still hot from where I'd hit him and it burned, throbbing at my side.

After the crack that echoed through the air, we were hauntingly silent.

I was shaking, my breath shallow and quick as I watched him.

He remained frozen, his chin tilted away from me and down to where I'd hit him.

I hadn't hit him hard enough to hurt him, but I hit him… And that _did_ hurt him.

"Emmett, I'm sorry." I gasped in a panic, reaching for him again with trembling hands.

He whirled around, grabbing my wrist tightly enough that it took my breath out of my chest.

I shrunk under his gaze, scared.

The look on his face scared me, truly scared me not because of what I was afraid he'd do to me.

I was afraid of what I'd done to him. I saw the depth of what it meant to him in his eyes.

He knew now that I was ugly and poisonous and awful…

"Don't you _ever_ do that again." Emmett wore a dark, angry snarl on his face, holding my gaze captive in his.

He kept his grip on my wrist angrily and it panicked me, but I shook my head, letting him know I wouldn't dare hit him again.

Something I thought I saw in his eyes had already given up on me and it terrified me.

I nodded swiftly taking a deep inhale.

"I'm so sorry…" My voice shook and I wondered if I could ever come back from this.

"I… I…" I immediately broke down, panicking.

I realized then, maybe _I was ruined_ and it scared me to my bones…

I needed no excuse other than that.

_I was ruined. _

He saw through me, and I was afraid that's what he was going to say. I was ruined.

I wasn't the Rosalie Hale he would've easily fallen in love with anymore. I was selfish, manipulative, cold, and calculating…

Why couldn't this go away?

I wanted to be the Rosalie Hale that I remembered before all this. I wanted to be the Rosalie Hale that I liked… _before_….

Now, I hated this girl.

My bottom lip trembled, and I reached both of my arms out to try and duck into his side, burying my face in him to cry. Maybe he'd understand how sorry I was.

"No. I'm not playing your games, Rosalie." He saw through my brutality and pushed me away. "I'm a lot smarter than you think I am and your cruelty isn't enough to distract me."

He exhaled, exasperated with my difficulty as he turned away from me, beginning to walk away.

I so desperately hoped he wouldn't give up, but it was evident he'd begun to, and I was _screaming_ on the inside.

"Emmett _please_." I begged him as I reached for his hand.

I stood in front of him, looking up into his eyes, begging for him to see my sincerely broken heart over what I'd done to him.

His eyes changed then, like a calming storm.

"I'm so sorry. Emmett… I…" I tripped over my words. "Emmett, please forgive me."

He reached to tilt my chin up and he kept his fingers on my face as our eyes met one another's again.

I saw forgiveness in his eyes as his resolve weakened and he extended grace I didn't know if I deserved.

I was so deeply filled with remorse that I felt too heavy to be standing atop the earth. I kept my eyes attached to Emmett, but I wondered if I looked down at my feet I'd see they were sinking.

"_I would never hurt you_." Emmett told me with the deepest sincerity he could muster, his voice caressing my senses. "I need you to know that. I could _never_ hurt you."

As much as I believed in him, he believed in me.

I could be better.

I had to be.

I was filled with guilt. I was filled with pain. I'd hurt him.

Not physically, but I hurt him nonetheless.

This time, when I reached for him, he let me and I ducked my head into his chest. I indulged in pressing my hands into his back, feeling like my cells could absorb him.

I took a deep inhale, closing my eyes.

"I'm so sorry." I breathed.

"Me too." His arms wound around my shoulders and after a long moment, he ducked his lips to my hair.

I felt it at every corner of my being.

"I shouldn't have said all that… that way." Emmett exhaled. "I… I wasn't really good with my words… And... I didn't mean to yell at you..."

Our eyes met in a moment like waves crashing violently against the shore.

"How did you do it?" I asked Emmett in a breathless whisper.

"Do what?" He asked, his voice calmed now.

"How did you keep from being _ruined_?" I swallowed, nervous.

I felt his breath fill his chest, then he exhaled and rubbed a circle on my shoulder.

"I guess I just always wanted to be _more_ than what he did." Emmett said with honest simplicity. "I didn't want to be the poor kid that got the shit knocked out of him by a drunk, deadbeat father. I didn't want to be anything. I wanted to be Emmett McCarty and what _I_ decided that meant. I wanted to have a story separate from the one forced on me."

I clenched my jaw, his words like alcohol on a wound.

His honesty was startling, even though he didn't have it in him be any other way. I processed his words in my ego, wondering if I could ever have a story separate from the one Royce had forced on me.

Or was it too late for me?

What about the story that Carlisle had forced on me. This existence...

The story I'd forced on Emmett even knowing all of the consequences...

"And… And… Rosalie, you know I could never repay you for what you did for me. This life… This gift…"

I frowned, pulling away to look at him now, convinced there was no way he was truly thinking this existence was a gift.

"But you know I've been…. havin' trouble… being… _myself_ while also being a vampire. And… I _do_ want to… be _more_ than… _this_ too." Emmett drug the toe of his boot in the snow, his focus going down as he spoke about his vulnerability. "I wanna be more than just… instincts and… _blood... _For you. 'Cause you... you should know the best of me if there's any of that left..."

He swallowed painfully after the word blood.

I noticed the way the snow collected in his hair made him especially handsome. I knotted my fingers together.

"And… And well, that's why I need you to tell me who I am. I don't want to forget. I worked real hard to be it." Emmett sighed, keeping his eyes away from mine. "I don't _want_ to be a monster…"

"Especially not to you." He continued with clenched teeth and a darkness to his voice that made me shiver, but not out of fear.

My mind raced, and as we stood together in a full, heavy silence, one thought continually pressed at my mind. It was a thought that pained me, but I knew what I had to do.

I pressed my palms into his back, closing my eyes.

I was imperfect.

I was broken.

But was I… _ruined_?

Was I beyond repair?

I felt guilty, exposed, and vulnerable, but mostly I felt dread.

Was I ruined?… I certainly felt ruined, and this argument had almost proven it.

But, if I was ruined that would mean I was _powerless_ for the rest of eternity.

And, I hated feeling powerless again…

Like I'd felt when Royce shoved himself inside of me while I was lying flat on my stomach in the street, his hands pulling at my hair and groping at my body.

The sounds he'd made….

I reminisced instead on Royce's screams, his _pain _as I killed him…. I wasn't powerless then.

I had _never_ felt more powerful.

But had it just been a temporary illusion? Had Royce truly _ruined_ me beyond repair?

Would I have to carry it with me for all time?

Was my continued pain representative of his eternal power over me?

I couldn't let that happen.

God, no. I couldn't let that happen.

I wondered then if Royce knew… Did he know he was going to _ruin_ me? Did he even consider it? Did any of those men?

Did they act without even knowing how it would affect me? Did they even care?

Or were they too drunk to even acknowledge I was a human being.

They certainly made me feel like an animal.

I knew what was wrong with me. Royce was.

He abused my body. He abused my psyche. He abused my trust.

I had scars that didn't go way with transformation.

I had to be perfect in every other way to make up for what I viewed as this fatal flaw. I couldn't be proud of my accomplishments. No matter how good I got at music or how many books I read or ways I could make myself look more devastatingly beautiful, I felt unworthy of praise.

I was still so filled with shame.

Royce and his friends had dirtied me. They'd broken me.

I found little peace in knowing he was dead.

I wanted to be able to laugh and take afternoon strolls and worry about the weather, but I couldn't.

I couldn't do that anymore.

I was too burdened.

I didn't want to be broken anymore. I didn't want to be filled with poison.

I _hated_ feeling this way.

I was sick of living my life as a victim of Royce's monstrosity. I was sick of my immortality reminding me of what he did.

After I'd told Dorothy what happened to me, I decided I _wanted_ to heal. I wanted to get better, but that honestly has just made it harder, because it made me much more aware of my weakness and powerlessness.

I'd told Dorothy she was not what happened to her, so why couldn't I separate myself from what Royce had done to me?

I didn't want to live my life as Royce's victim anymore. I didn't want to be broken anymore.

I didn't want to be _ruined_ anymore.

Because it was ruining things with Emmett.

And God, he was the only thing I had any faith in anymore.

Now, if only I could've said those words out loud.

Emmett held me in his arms in a haven and I synchronized breath with his - slow, calm, and even.

"I was returning from the last of them – the death I'd saved so I could indulge and savor as I killed him, the one I thought would _finally_ bring absolution – _when I found you_." I admitted and this time I looked up at him.

His black eyes searched my face with wonder, not resentment or disgust as he looked into my assassin's eyes and he reached out to touch my face. I stepped forward under his gaze, tilting my chin up as his fingers cradled my cheek like I was the most precious thing in the world to him.

The wounds of our argument were festering no longer. They were being soothed and tended.

"When I finally killed him, I thought that'd make me happy enough to survive the rest of this existence. But it didn't. It wasn't enough." I swallowed nervously. "I was still empty..."

He listened with openness and regard, and I let myself be tethered to the present as I leaned into his hand. It was warm, leaving a trail like sunshine on my skin.

My dead heart beat rapidly in my chest as I looked up at him.

"But, when I saw your face…" I began, my voice seeming small and unsteady, but he looked at me with depth and purpose and meaning that pushed me to continue.

"You reminded me of someone… someone I'd never met but knew so vividly as if I had always known them because… because I thought of them incessantly. I still do." I continued, knowing I was speaking in a riddle and resenting the fact that he couldn't just read my mind.

But, my mind was such a tangle I wondered if that would've even been easier.

He reminded me of a child I'd never have, but how in God's name would that go over if I told him that?

My riddle had confused him, but he waited.

"My best friend in my human life… Her name was Vera. _Is_ Vera."

"That's who you sent Dorothy to see?" Emmett asked, his thumb tracing over my cheek as he looked over my face.

I nodded.

"So, she had this baby boy…" I started, my thoughts getting more and more convoluted. "And… I had never been jealous of anyone before, but… I was jealous of her."

"Because of the baby?" Emmett tried to understand patiently.

"Yes… and… well not just that." I frowned, trying to make sense of what all I was trying to say. "She was loved. Her husband _kissed_ her… really kissed her. I'd never seen my father kiss my mother like that. I'd never…"

Emmett took a slow, deep inhale as I looked away from him in embarrassment.

"When I looked at you under that bear... I saw everything I'd lost. Everything that was taken from me. Everything Carlisle didn't consider when he changed me." I felt intensity rise in my voice that I didn't know if he was able to process or understand. "Vera's baby had dark curly hair… and… and dimples on his cheeks."

I sighed, exasperated at my painful vulnerability.

Somehow, miraculously though, understanding flashed over his face.

"In your face, I saw…" I trailed off not knowing how to phrase this.

But, he waited with openness.

"What I wanted… more than anything in my human life… the children I always wanted, the grandchildren playing in tall green grass…" I said, turning my face in embarrassment of my honesty. "I saw _myself_… For the first time in a long time, or maybe… maybe _ever._"

"You weren't a peace offering from Carlisle. I just... I wanted all those things I saw in your face to live, I wanted _you_ to live. And before, all I had wanted were my own children, a husband to kiss me when he came home, to grow old with and drink lemonade on front porches with in the summertime…" I trailed off, my voice soft. "I wanted to _love_ and be loved… I didn't think it was too much to ask…"

"And now, you can't have that?" He asked with a statement of intense heartache that signaled he had chosen to bear my burdens in a way no one had offered to do before.

It left me intensely vulnerable and my body's response to vulnerability was to panic and ice him out. I fought every instinct to do so as I looked up into his eyes.

"No. I can't." I admitted in deep heartbrokenness. "We're frozen in this state for eternity. I can't… have children."

"I'm sorry." Emmett told me sincerely, his eyes black as night, but endlessly deep as he offered his authentic empathy to me. "I'm really sorry."

He thought this was the depth of my brokenness, but he was so wrong. It wasn't even scratching the surface.

Emmett traced his hands over my face in reverence, not pity, and that's what made him different than the others.

If I tilted up my chin a little, I'd be close enough to kiss him, but of course I didn't dare.

"I told Dorothy how I died." I finally admitted to him in a way that rushed out of my mouth like vomit, and it felt like I'd just been burned alive. "But, of course I didn't tell her it killed me."

"You did?" He asked with a careful tenderness to his voice like he didn't want to scare me off; his eyes were searching for answers in my face that I hoped he wouldn't find.

"And… and I'll tell you too, when I'm ready." I swallowed, looking down and away. "But… But, I'm not ready yet. And… it's not because I don't…. trust you. It's because…"

_It's because I think… it ruined me, and I don't want you to know I'm ruined._

My voice progressively got higher and more anxious before I trailed off in a breathless shrill. His arm returned to around my shoulders, pulling me back in even though I didn't say the part I'd hoped to say out loud and finally share what burdened me.

_I was still too ashamed. _

I exhaled into him, feeling calm all over again.

"The scar on my eye, I got for a pretty dumb ass reason." Emmett started softly in response to all I'd revealed.

He sensed it was difficult for me.

I looked up at him and saw it in the tenderness of his eyes. He wanted me to know him.

"I found this vine and had this bright idea we could use it swing out over the river and jump; everybody told me it wasn't strong enough. I told 'em they were cowards and I'd try it out first. It snapped and I fell face first into all these rocks below. I broke my nose for the first time that day too. Obviously I was most devastated about that you know… potentially ruining my good looks."

I couldn't help but smile as I noticed that there were dimples on his cheek now, deeply set in his skin as he remembered.

It put me at ease to feel him coming back into himself again.

"The one on my lip, I honest to God don't remember. Coulda been anything." He dismissed but this time it wasn't a lie. "I got my lip busted so many times…"

I winced.

"But, this one" he ran a thumb along his cheekbone, "_that_ one" - he corrected himself to a past tense - "I was especially proud of 'cause I _knew_ I didn't deserve it. I knew I'd done the right thing, and I didn't regret it one bit.… When Dorothy sewed it up, I was glad it left a scar because I knew it'd always be a reminder of that… What I believed in. Who I wanted to be. Who I was in spite of it all."

I watched his countenance shift, the cold air thick around us.

"There was a girl…" Emmett started his story and my stomach immediately dropped.

I was irrationally devastated and jealous.

"Her Mama had made her this new coat. It was just a bunch of tattered up rags, but it had these gold buttons on it and she was so proud of that coat." Emmett's eyes traced over the gold buttons on the front of my dress as if it was some sort of tangible connection to the memory.

I still shallowly wondered about the girl.

"While she was walking home from town, there were these stupid boys that were pickin' on her… They ripped the buttons off her new coat…"

My heart sank and my thoughts went dark as I thought of Royce ripping the jacket off my shoulders… The brass buttons scattering all over the street.

In a new reaction to trauma, I tried tying myself to the present with a connection to the tangible. I reached for Emmett's hand where it rested on my waist and it guided him to pull me closer.

I took deep, even breaths, the smell of tobacco and thyme braiding through my senses to keep me here.

He kept me here this time.

"So, I kicked their asses and walked her home…" Emmett went on. "My father had… a few words to say about it…"

"Bonnie." I recalled the story Dorothy had told me immediately, the details of it lining up.

That was the girl.

"Yeah… _Bonnie_." Emmett exhaled in a sort of awe that I knew.

The details of the story were sharp in my mind, so I knew how it ended… I knew how he got that scar.

"How did you?…" He asked.

"Dorothy told me…" I said softly. "She said you stuck up for her, even though you knew your father wouldn't approve…"

Emmett snorted a little humorless chuckle.

"Should I be afraid of all the things Dorothy told you about me?" He raised an eyebrow in faux worry.

It amused us both

"No. Not at all." I said with a little smile, turning to look at him now, to see the uninterrupted perfection of his face, no scars, no reminders.

I took a deep breath then took the plunge.

I stood on my tip toes to plant a kiss on his cheek where that scar once was, as his self-proclaimed reminder of the one right thing he'd ever done in his life, where I'd hit him and left an intangible mark of the worst thing I'd ever done.

This was his next right thing and my next right thing, and as I pressed my lips to his cheek, I felt refreshed with liveliness like a first spring.

I'd been dead, for longer than I'd actually been dead - maybe I'd died slowly long ago at sixteen or seventeen when I settled for _less_ than love, just infatuation and admiration. Either way, I was made alive in this moment.

His hand slowly rose to cup my face and I felt him slightly tilt his chin down in a way that brought his lips to the corner of my mouth.

He waited, his breath sweet on mine, and I knew I needed to meet him halfway if I wanted to kiss him.

It didn't feel right to kiss him in this moment, but I wasn't _afraid_.

I felt my stomach tie in knots, and I tilted my chin up and away from his, denying his kiss but not sure if that was actually what I wanted. My dead heart felt like it was racing.

Emmett kept his hand on my face and I felt him inhale slowly before he pulled back to look at me. I didn't have to pull away and for this I was thankful, but I was also confused.

Why didn't he kiss me?

His black eyes didn't seem so menacing, but were black as a raven's feathers flying over my face, and filling with new enthusiasm each moment.

"I _know_ you, Emmett." I told him, my words feeling burning hot on my tongue and I worried about their delivery. "And I very much _like_ knowing you."

I referenced one of the very first conversations we ever had with one another when he insisted we were _supposed_ to know each other.

Now, I was actually starting to believe it.

He remembered the conversation I referenced easily and found my eyes as he looked down at me in his arms.

My heart floated above my body as we became enchanted all anew under each other's gaze.

I'd told him he was enough for me then and he knew it. I just wanted to believe it, and I wanted to believe that even as broken as I was - I'd be enough for him too.

"And, I want you to know me too." I went on, feeling anxious but strangely at peace as I said it. "But… sometimes I can be quite… _selfish and cold and manipulative_."

"Rose, I shouldn't have said all that nonsense earlier… I…" He exhaled in an apologetic tone.

"No, I know I can be pretty… _difficult_…" I bit my lip, ignoring his attempt at an apology. He could leave that for Carlisle.

He frowned and shook his head, evidently disagreeing with me and the brutality of his bluntness earlier.

"But, I don't truly_ mean_ to be." I said in a shaky voice because I was anticipating the vulnerability I was going to have to show. "Especially not to _you_. I… Just need a little more time, and…"

What was I even asking for? It didn't make any sense. Was I asking him to be patient with me? To suffer through my mood swings and impossible standards and games? Was I asking him to _accept_ me?

Was I asking him to _forgive_ me?

"Whatever you've got, I want it. Rosalie, look at me. I want it _all_. I want to know you, all of it, even the bad stuff you think I won't like, I will because, I like _you_." He took my face in his hands and my heart rose to my throat. "And… I think you're… _perfect_."

His bold words sunk in and my eyes settled on his mouth wondering what it'd be like to kiss him.

He…_ liked_ me.

Like a silly school girl, I was enchanted by the fairytale of it, but as a woman jaded by experience… I was afraid.

I turned my face away from him, a frown settling absently over my features.

His eyes were impossibly blacker than night, and his skin was whiter than the snow. I sensed nervousness in him just like there was nervousness in me and somehow it calmed me.

I took a deep breath.

Then, true to my form, I deflected and distracted him when I felt vulnerable.

"Let's go hunt. You've suffered long enough." I said and at this all traces of him left his face and he was a predator again.

"What about Carlisle?" Emmett asked, but he was already vibrating with pent up energy and looking east.

"I'll deal with Carlisle." I shrugged, kicking off my heels to start sprinting through the woods.


	15. No Choir (Part I)

_"And, oddly enough, he needs me, too. That part worked out better than I could have hoped." - Rosalie, Eclipse, p. 165 (Stephenie Meyer)_

Quick note: I edited and re-edited this chapter so many times that it's now a three-part chapter! I'll post the next part of the chapter tomorrow! I appreciate your patience as I get back into a routine with school and mental health care. I really value your kindness and your reviews! Thank you for investing in me and this story. It absolutely heals my heart. Even in my struggles, I am encouraged by you guys.

In this chapter, I touch on some struggles that Rosalie has with her sexuality that I definitely relate to as I navigate through my own past, and so it is slightly cathartic to write about this disjointedness and shame. I felt that the guilt after her assault is confusing for her in so so many ways and it keeps revealing itself in unhealthy behaviors. I think she feels flawed and impure to consider that after what she went through she could even want love and connection with Emmett to happen and it's creating quite the predicament here in this chapter and the next section more intently.

HOWEVER, I did try to write some light fluffy things into this chapter to balance it out hehe.

ALSO IMPORTANT INFO: This song at the top of the chapter is the one that I relate to the most in my own life, but also I find the most relevant to this story and to Rosalie's experience in particular. "The loneliness never left me. I always took it with me, but I can put it down in the pleasure of your company." Since the first time I read Twilight I always felt a deep understanding of Rosalie and maybe I projected myself onto her... But I just really appreciate having this outlet to cope with the darkness in my life and to create on a character by Stephenie Meyer that I have such a strong love and perceived understanding of.

Please consider leaving a review! Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

TW/CW: Rosalie's reference to her assault, Abuse, Shame surrounding sexuality

* * *

**_No Choir_**

_And it's hard to write about being happy_

_'Cause the older I get_

_I find that happiness is an extremely uneventful subject_

_And there would be no grand choirs to sing_

_No chorus could come in_

_About two people sitting doing nothing_

_But I must confess_

_I did it all for myself_

_I gathered you here to hide from some vast unnameable fear_

_But the loneliness never left me_

_I always took it with me_

_But I can put it down in the pleasure of your company_

_And there will be no grand choirs to sing_

_No chorus will come in_

_No ballad will be written_

_It will be entirely forgotten_

_And if tomorrow it's all over_

_At least we had it for a moment_

_Oh, darling, things seem so unstable_

_But for a moment we were able to be still_

* * *

**Rosalie**

His thirst made him sloppy and desperate, but he ran with intent, following the scent of some elk. He overtook me on the path, and I let him.

He'd think I was competing for the food source if I pushed too fast and he could turn on me.

It worried me immensely so I was overly careful. I was glad I wasn't thirsty and I slowed my run so he would know he was uncontested.

As he broke through the trees snarling with thirst, he reached his goal with euphoria.

I wanted to look away, but I didn't and he ravenously drained a 1,500 pound animal in seconds.

Blood lingered in the corner of his mouth that he flicked away with the tip of his tongue, his eyes searching for the others.

There were two more about 35 feet north.

He focused into a sprint, his power and strength evident even though he didn't need even a fraction of it to overpower them.

The hunt was still in his eyes so I didn't follow him closely, but I kept watch on him as he stalked a pack of wolves.

Then, just as I sensed it, he did too and something better had caught his attention.

"This'll be fun." Amazingly, he focused to grin at me, a wide boyish grin before he went on his hunt.

Emmett provoked a large Alaskan bear that was readying for hibernation so that it stood on its hind legs, roaring angrily over his head.

Emmett lunged at the bear, but toyed with it letting the bear rake its huge paw across his chest, ripping through the fabric of his shirt, but not even scratching his perfectly vampiric skin.

I recalled a time when he was much more fragile, but now… Now he had the power, and he laughed with exhilaration.

He was beautiful.

I lowered myself to sit on a nearby boulder, watching the bear try to snap at him, only to stagger back against Emmett's concrete skin. Emmett finally threw himself at the bear, taking the both of them to the forest floor with a loud thud. The bear growled menacingly at Emmett, but as Emmett growled back I shuddered with an odd feeling of my own exhilaration.

It was amazing to see him in this fight with the upper hand this time.

Within a minute, Emmett rolled to his back in the snow, gazing up at the sky with a satisfied grin.

He pushed himself up on his hands to look at me from across the clearing with a smile and a sigh.

His shirt was ripped clean off his center, totally destroyed and his raven black curly hair was matted with sticky tree sap from the feigned struggle.

"God, what a rush." Emmett childishly chuckled as he shot to his feet.

I couldn't help but smile back at him.

I was relieved.

What was Carlisle so worked up about?

He was fine.

"Are you not thirsty?" Emmett asked, trying to run a hand through his hair, but deciding against it in its messy state.

I shook my head, but he offered his hand to me to help me down from the rock.

"I'm all right." I was amused at his new lightness as he spun me under his arm like we were dancing.

His eyes were the color of rust and the change seemed to bring color to his entire face.

I was still wary though and I didn't trust it completely.

His eyes darted down and I noticed with embarrassment that when I was running, I'd ripped my skirt into a high slit up my thigh.

"I'd offer you my coat but…" Emmett recalled we'd left it on the edge of the cliff.

"Oh, it's fine." I bit my lip, nervously tittering.

"If you didn't find it too forward, I'd say that I never seen legs so many miles long in my life." Emmett said, turning away from me and starting back the way we came in boyish flirtation.

"And, I'm mighty sorry." Emmett sighed, turning back toward me again.

"For what?" I furrowed my brow, trying not to acknowledge what he'd said about me.

"For being glad I don't have a coat to offer you." He snickered boldly.

I gawked, open mouthed. Something about the way he said such forward things was still so _innocent_. He was forthcoming in a childishly playful way.

Sure, I'd had plenty of admirers in my time, but something about his forwardness wasn't pushy. It was light and airy. It didn't weigh on me heavily or come with any sort of expectation of reciprocation.

He told me these things just because he felt I should know them.

He chuckled, and I couldn't help but laugh a little musical laugh as he put his arm around me, playfully pulling me into his side so he could give me a familiar kiss on the cheek of my very own.

It was like fireworks on the fourth of July in my head right then, feeling the velvet coolness of his full, perfect lips on my skin, even for half of a second.

"Did that work on all of your charming Tennessee girls?" I nervously responded, by pulling away and awkwardly trying my hand at flirting with him.

"That wasn't some line, Rosalie." Emmett assured me easily with a little laugh.

"And, it wouldn't matter if it worked before. What matters is it's working _now_." He spoke confidently and assuredly.

"You think it's working now?" I raised an eyebrow, flirting and playing coy.

"Yeah, yeah I think it is." He grinned at me. "You're trying not to smile at me."

The corner of my mouth twitched.

"Ah, there it is." He was in awe, speaking excitedly.

I didn't bother stopping my smile then, looking down and to my feet. I bit my lip.

"It's not proper to comment on a lady's legs before you've courted her for quite some time." I scolded lightly, trying to keep my voice even as I willed my smile to stop.

My stomach was in my throat.

"Did you find it improper for me to say?" Emmett found my eyes, genuinely asking and not just testing me or my boundaries.

"I'm not sure." I swallowed nervously, finding his eyes once again.

He noticed I was failing at hiding my smile and it angered me so. He knew_ I_ didn't truly find it improper, I just knew social graces had deemed it to be.

"So what does it mean to _court_ you, then?" Emmett asked, obviously not having used this word to describe a relationship before because it sounded foreign on his mouth.

Nervousness whirled all around me.

"It depends." I breathed.

"On?" He raised an eyebrow.

"Well, it just _depends_." I stumbled on my words. "Haven't you courted a girl before?"

Anticipation pounded in my head.

"Well, I don't rightly know what _courting_ is so I can't honestly say." He played with my words.

"Courting is just doing things that… well, showing that you _fancy_ the other person and…."

"Well, I'll just tell you and skip that part. I _fancy_ you." He nodded, matter-of-factly. "And I didn't kiss you just 'cause I could. I did it to _show_ you I…"

My head was spinning and my dead heart seemed to 'ker-thunk' in my chest.

"You aren't thinking clearly right now. You're blood drunk." I mumbled, cutting him off.

"I _am_ thinking clearly." Emmett argued strongly, obviously angered by this but not wanting to lash out unthinkingly and prove my point. "How long will it take for you to believe that?"

I furrowed my brow.

"You're still a new vampire, Emmett." I said evenly.

"And you're still afraid of me." He said tenderly so it wasn't accusatory.

I still had my guards up though so I frowned.

"Why are you afraid of me?" He asked.

"I've told you a thousand times. I'm _not_ afraid of you." I bowed up, standing confidently under his gaze or at least I tried to _appear_ confident to him.

He just nodded and I shivered away.

"Then how _do_ you feel about me?" He asked the same question he'd asked what seemed like centuries ago, but I still didn't have an answer for him.

This time though, he took a step forward, taking my face in his hands tenderly, but with a boldness that set my skin on fire.

I inhaled, tasting him on my tongue in the air between us…

"I'm still deciding." I whispered because that's the only sound that could come out of my mouth.

"Between?" He asked genuinely.

I didn't immediately answer.

"It's not _between_ any two things. It's… it's _among_." I answered nervously.

"Then what'll help your decision?" He smiled, charming me to my core.

Again, I was too nervous to answer and I took a deep inhale.

"Time." I finally decided to respond to his honesty with my own.

"Well, luckily I've got plenty of it." Emmett's dimples deepened in his cheeks.

He was just positively darling…

I looked down at my feet, afraid to be held captive in his gaze, but he tilted my chin up with the tips of his fingers.

"Will you give me some of your time then, Rosalie?" He asked, requesting this tenderly.

I clenched my jaw.

"Please." He traced his thumb over my cheek, looking down on me in a way I recognized as doting. "Gimme a chance."

I just nodded.

"Well, hot dog!" He grinned happily, dropping his hands from my face now to pick me up and spin me around.

I tensed all my muscles at the surprise of it, but I realized when he put me down that I was smiling.

"If you're thinking clearly, do you _really_ think I've been trying to _fix you_ this whole time?" I asked, making all traces of my smile disappear easily.

I recalled just a short time ago that we'd screamed in each other's faces full of unbridled rage. I'd hit him. He'd told me I was difficult and cold and manipulative.

But by some sort of miracle, I felt closer to him than I ever had. No one had ever seen how awful that I could be and bothered sticking around.

He did. He saw my darkness, but he looked at me with light in his eyes.

This filled me with vulnerability I couldn't process and at the lightness of my heart, I couldn't help but push him away.

He was right. I was too afraid.

I self-sabotaged.

I didn't want to be ruined, but in my response to this moment of happiness and lightness, I couldn't help it…

At the first sign of vulnerability, I knew how to sabotage expertly…

Emmett took a deep breath, apparently frustrated at my redirection, but he didn't let go of me. Instead, he put his hands on my shoulders to trace down my arms and down to my hands as he took them in his.

I wasn't wearing gloves… I hadn't put them back on.

I recoiled my fingers, but he laced his through mine to hold onto them.

"Yes." Emmett spoke candidly in response to my question, honesty filling his eyes as he ducked his head so I'd have to look at him. "Yes I do. Because it's easier for you to think about me that way."

I frowned.

"What do you mean?"

"I think you do truly want me to be better, to get my thirst under control, to catch up with school, to come to terms with my past, and to get along with all the others so that during that journey I'll be focused more on how much _I_… I _need_ you." Emmett exhaled this, weight and meaning in his words. "And I do. I need your help and I know it…"

"But you'd rather me focus on myself than… that _you_ need me too." He claimed honestly. "You want to be happy, Rosalie, and I think you know that_ I_ _could_ make you happy. I also think it scares you now that you know I _want_ to make you happy, and I do… so much."

I inhaled sharply, stiffening in his hands, but I was hopeless to tear my eyes from his.

He was looking at me like he was going to kiss me, and I… I would let him.

"It means you have to_ let me_ try to make you happy." He insisted, and I _melted_ under his genuine gaze.

I'd never been looked at like that by anyone else in the world.

"And that's hard for you… I can't pretend to understand why, but I know it's hard for you." He _saw_ me, and this special brand of vulnerability sliced right through my heart.

I melted into him and as he bowed his head, I almost didn't turn mine so that his kiss was replaced onto my cheek.

His lips lingered on my skin, seeming to test… to invite me just to turn a few centimeters…

But could I?…

Something made him pull away before I could and I was left with an odd emptiness that I misunderstood for nervousness in the moment, but as he dropped his hands from mine, I knew.

I wanted him to kiss me.

"Should we get back?" He asked, his eyes searching through mine.

I wondered what he'd find.

My dead heart raced in my chest.

"Not yet." I exhaled, seeming to fill the space between us with a hanging breath.

His smile lit up the sky, and for a moment I thought dawn would come early as sunshine filled his eyes.

"Okay." He agreed, and in this moment something beyond my brain wished he was touching me.

"Hey, you wanna go for a swim?" Emmett suggested in response, looking at the lake just about a hundred yards through the woods.

It was an idyllic scene and the water sparkled with the rising sunlight. The icy water looked like glass, mirroring the beautiful sky above. Mist rose off the surface like some sort of other worldly fantasy.

But that was nothing compared to the impossible way he looked at me.

"I need to get cleaned up anyways." Emmett grabbed my hand confidently, leading me to the bank. "It'll be fun."

I panicked. This wasn't what I'd had in mind.

It felt beyond my control.

He dropped my hand and began pulling off his shoes. He started on the buttons of his shirt, and my stomach floated around in my center.

"I don't have anything appropriate to wear." I mumbled, dropping my eyes.

"Yeah well, me neither." He shrugged, taking off his shirt. "Turn around and I'll jump in then you do the same. It's the Tennessee way."

He snickered in jest, but I knew he was serious. As he started on his belt, I felt my breath hitch in my throat.

"No." I said, turning my back, embarrassed. "We're not in Tennessee. We're in Alaska."

"Oh come on, Rosalie." He pushed, putting his hand on my back. "It's not like we get cold."

I flinched away, all attitudes of joking long gone.

"Come on, what's the matter? Can you swim?" Emmett wondered.

"I can swim." I exhaled, feeling my limbs getting heavy and light all at once as I heard his pants drop.

"Then tell me what's wrong." He requested tenderly.

God, his immodesty was preposterously savage. It irrationally angered me.

"I don't want…. to _take my clothes off_ in front of you." I turned around, not allowing myself a real look at him because I knew it would've made me distracted and weak minded.

"Oh well, I wouldn't dare think anything of it. Honest." Emmett held up his right hand to swear and I saw the authenticity in his eyes.

"I… I can't." I said mousily.

"Then you don't have to." He grinned a devilish grin then, grabbing my hand and pulling me to the edge of the water.

I squealed with what I think was surprising delight as he swung me into his arms and jumped into the icy lake.

I hadn't even taken off my shoes.

I emerged to the surface and pushed my hair back, thinking briefly about how I looked disheveled.

I was caught off guard, and I fidgeted to hold my shoes in my hand now.

He laughed a bellowing laugh that I'm sure they heard all across Denali.

My soul felt light in my chest and I felt an odd fluttering sensation in my stomach at the spontaneity that was wildly out of character for me.

Outwardly though I frowned, sending an angry splash in his direction.

"Aren't you glad you agreed to swim with me?" He smiled, his dimples deep in his cheeks as he swam a circle around me.

I noticed his raven black hair dripping little rivers down the sides of his neck before he pushed his wet hair back off his forehead.

"I don't recall ever _agreeing_ to this." I jabbed, treading water.

As I'd anticipated, treading water was made nearly next to impossible in the confines of this dress and I growled in displeasure.

He grinned enthusiastically before he pushed to shoot across the water on his back, totally unburdened.

I noticed the perfectly sculpted muscles of his torso and the way they moved with his deep inhale.

Emmett snickered, obviously amused by my anger, before he dove back under the water only to emerge right in front of me a couple seconds later.

Instinctually, he guided my arms around his neck so I wouldn't have to tread water in my dress.

I was timid, but I let him.

I watched the way the water looked on his ivory skin, the way it made him glisten.

I willed my arms not to tremble around his neck as I felt him across the front of my body.

His skin…

"You're so beautiful." Emmett marveled at me a new secretiveness to his voice, a new awe.

"Thank you." I lowered my eyes, insecure under his gaze and his closeness.

"I want to know everything about you. I mean it. " He said plainly as if this was something I simply must hear.

His eyes sparkled in a way they'd never sparkled as he looked over my face.

"Oh… no…" I frowned a little, not wanting to get launched into the depths of my darkness. "You don't."

"I told you. I do." He insisted. "And you said you wanted me to know you."

"Well, I sometimes get ahead of myself." I murmured.

He chuckled, but was undeterred.

"Tell me the last thing that made you happy." He requested.

I furrowed my brow.

My inhale deepened into my tummy.

"I… I was human then." I swallowed, knowing I was being cruel by not acknowledging any of his attempts.

However, he was undeterred and didn't look negatively affected by my neglect. Instead, there was a spark in his eye that told me he was going to push forward.

"What is it you miss so much about being human?" Emmett asked instead, ice collecting on the ends of his newly cold and vampiric fingers as he traced patterns in the snow.

I took a deep breath of the frozen air around me, metaphoric for the frozen time loop I'd pulled him into.

"Change." I settled on a word I knew could encompass it.

"Things can still change, Rose." He suggested tenderly.

"Not like I'd want them to." I said, believing this strongly.

He opened his mouth to speak, but a boyish nervousness filled his eyes as he decided against it.

"What's your mother's name?" Emmett asked randomly, his eyes full of genuine interest as he changed the subject.

He waited, listening to hear what I had to say not just to respond.

At a question so simple, I stumbled through my thoughts. No one'd ever listened to me like his gaze promised he would.

"Lillian." I responded. "It's my middle name."

Emmett smiled.

"And your father?"

"Robert." I nodded, feeling the slightest bit of nostalgia for the way his pipe used to smell as he smoked in the evenings.

"What were they like?" He asked, his eyes darting over my face.

"Well, they were parents…" I sighed, not knowing exactly how to put it.

He waited.

"My father worked at the bank, and my mother was…" I tried to think of any defining quality of my mother, but I honestly didn't know anything bout her identity outside of me. "In charge of the debutante ball in town."

"What is that?" He puzzled.

"Well, it's like cotillion." I expanded, but this was still not enlightening to him. "It's when young women are officially presented to society. They dress up and dance and are introduced and have to perform a curtsy."

"Why?" He asked me.

"Well, _because_." I didn't really ever think of a reason. It was just tradition. "It shows grace and poise and good manners, and it is an important society debut. It means you've reached maturity and you're ready to be considered for marriage."

Emmett had a weird look on his face.

"That sounds real fancy. Like old time princess type stuff. Did you do that?" He asked.

I clenched my jaw.

"Yes."

"Was your curtsy up to standard?" He raised an eyebrow, but I knew what he was really asking.

"Obviously." I answered.

"I gotta see it to believe it." He insisted jokingly.

"I've been out of practice for a while." I responded lightly.

"Excuses, excuses." He rolled his eyes with a smile.

I didn't have to worry about trembling anymore as I kept my arms around his neck. I'd gotten more comfortable if that was even possible.

"So were you?…. You know, really _ready_ to be considered for marriage?" He asked what he'd initially set out to ask.

He was bold enough to.

"Yes." I answered tightly. "Yes, I was. My friend Vera was already married, and she'd told me the day before my debut that she was having a baby… So yes, I was ready for all of that."

"What stood in your way?" He looked over my face and I was afraid of what he'd see there.

I clenched my jaw.

"Nothing." I breathed.

He brushed my wet hair back, looking over my face with a weird look in his eyes. I couldn't read him, and I was too intimidated to.

"Did you want to go to college?" Emmett asked, completely changing the subject as if he'd sensed I'd reached my limit.

But, I knew this was also his way of tangentially trying to figure out why I hadn't married.

"No. There was not really a reason to at the time." I shrugged.

"What do you mean?"

"Girls like me didn't really go to college where I was from. We were expected just to marry well." I nodded, a sour taste in my mouth.

"Stand still, look pretty right?" Emmett hit the nail on the head.

"Something like that." I snorted a little laugh under my breath. "But I didn't really mind it at the time."

"Would you go to college now?" He asked, redirecting. "I mean, when you finish high school again in Washington?"

I hadn't thought about it, but… but I might.

"It's a possibility." I nodded, considering it.

"What would you want to study? What interests you?" He brushed a loose strand of hair from my face.

I gulped.

"I don't know. I've never thought that far ahead before." I puzzled, feeling vulnerable all of a sudden. "What about you?"

"Well, I stopped school at nine." He admitted, his eyes wide. "So I have a lot of catching up to do before then."

I just nodded, feeling uncomfortable like I'd said something wrong.

"And I didn't much pay attention before I dropped out anyways." He laughed, unburdened.

"You were reading Ernest Hemingway last Thursday." I commented on the fact he'd learned this skill swiftly. "What do you think?"

I treaded lightly though.

"He's on to something." Emmett nodded, removed. "He's the only one of those writers that actually says what he means."

"And for that same reason, I find his writing style vulgar." I shrugged.

He grinned, seeming pleased to discuss this with me simply because reading was something he knew I enjoyed.

That made my heart light.

I took a deep breath, but this was a bad idea because his perfect scent intoxicated me and I got distracted.

"What's your favorite book you've read?" Emmett asked simply to hear what I had to say.

"Oh, I don't know." I bit my bottom lip, trying to decide.

"Something flowery and indulgent I'd bet." Emmett teased with a little smile.

I felt him flirting with me, trying to connect with me on a level no one had tried to connect with me before as he picked through my brain, surfing through the curves of it and riding on the firing neurons.

"Naturally." I flirted back. "I tend to favor Romantic poetry as it is."

"Romance, eh?" He wagged his eyebrows.

I rolled my eyes.

"No, it just refers to a period of time and style in literature and…" I trailed off, knowing this wasn't going to stick anyway.

"Oh, I'm sure." He grinned childishly, dimples on full display.

"What about film? Did you ever go to the cinema?" I asked, feeling almost comfortable as we talked.

"Once in town." He seemed to try to remember then. "I can't recall what I saw."

"Human memories fade fast if you don't think of them." I acknowledged, knowing how incessantly I thought of mine.

Even though I longed to move on, I never wanted to forget…

A tinge of melancholy flooded his eyes, and so then we thought of them - a whole lot of them.

Human memories danced through our ears and poured out of our mouths as we shared them with one another in detail, treading through the icy water together.

He asked me my favorite films. I asked him his favorite songs. He laughed as I told him I'd learned to play golf only to be exceptionally terrible at it and broke a window at the country club. I grinned as he recalled what it was like to play hide and seek in a field of sunflowers. I told him about my childhood cat named Snow and he told me about the first time he fell off a horse. He talked about his friend Sam and the pranks they'd pull, and I told him about the day I met Vera and the names of the dolls I got for Christmas.

Something about being in the water, with something even that transient separating our physical forms made it so much easier to talk to him.

Even though water was far from a fortress, it seemed to protect me from feeling so exposed as we swam circles and treaded water around one another.

We could've been talking for days and neither of us would have noticed because just as we floated in the water we floated through time.

But, I noticed time passing in the way I felt being close to him and the ease in which I would be honest with him about my dreams and my fears.

I also noticed time passing in the way he looked at me, and now, holding me close, he looked down into my eyes a way I recognized familiarly.

"Don't look at me like that." I batted my eyelashes, looking down and away from his gaze.

"Why not?" He was too bold to ask in what way.

He also didn't underestimate my intelligence. He knew I was quite aware_ how_ he was looking at me.

He was looking at me like he was going to kiss me.

I gave him a little smile before I pushed away without an answer, retreating underwater and swimming to the other bank of the lake.

I was being ripped apart then, my heart and my body and my mind all reaching in opposition.

Then, like a wave, regret crashed over me.

I _knew_ I wanted him to kiss me, but something about it still kept a sick feeling deep in my stomach and this time it wasn't the physical closeness.

Emmett was unbothered by my rejection though, swimming through the icy water in a sort of self-satisfaction that didn't require me. He was enchanted by the wonder of the world around him, looking into the heavens and seeing the sky turn a beautiful array of colors for a new day.

A new beginning.

His eyes darted east to a little cliff coming up out of the water. I immediately knew his intent and watched a devilishly handsome smile spread across his face.

"Come on, we have to jump." He reached above him, pushing off to climb.

Though he climbed without effort or strain, the muscles of his back flared like a fire under his skin, and I couldn't help but notice… his _body_.

God in heaven.

"Rosalie! Come on!" He encouraged. "I'm gonna jump without you."

My gaze indulged, in a way I'd never indulged - completely objectifying him as he stood atop the cliff, ready to jump.

That's when lust over took me like a tidal wave and I realized that I'd never felt it before so it intruded noisily and clouded my mind in a way I hadn't been conditioned to control.

Life as a vampire intensified all emotions, but this one was catastrophically impactful because it wasn't something I'd felt before and it was so _foreign_ to my body…

I cringed, hating indulging in the feel of it. It tasted bad on my tongue. It tangled with guilt as I twisted and squirmed my legs under the water.

Humiliation imprisoned me and I ducked under the water and closed my eyes tightly, the sound of being underwater calming the rampant thoughts in my head.

Above the ground, I heard a wild hooping howl and emerged up to the surface to watch Emmett fly from the edge.

Freedom.

He couldn't wait.

I clenched my jaw resolutely, looking at the sunrise as a sign.

I could do this. I wanted to do this.

I wanted to get him to kiss me.

Maybe the moment had passed, but I wouldn't let it pass for long.

But, God, it felt… _wrong_ to want him after what I'd been through.

I felt… _guilty_…

I was… unclean… I was broken in and unworthy…

Shame ate at my center as I looked away, hating myself for even thinking about him making me whole again.

I was too much of a burden to bear.

And, it was a stupid thing to believe Emmett could even _fill_ the gaping hole I had.

My stupidity with Royce had cost me more than my life.

My breath caught in my throat as I ducked to submerge myself under the heavy weight of the water again, so I could think.

But, my mind was as murky as the dark, swirling water I dove deeper into.

I was pathetic…

All this time, was I just selfishly wanting_ him _to be better just so he could fix _me?_

I grew angry at myself and dove deeper into the lake.

Women weren't supposed to have desire.

Especially not a woman like me.

I clenched my jaw.

But, I_ wanted_ him to kiss me.

And that was preposterously _wrong_ of me to want. I couldn't want that.

Wanting physical closeness was just… absurd!

Especially after…

Maybe I was just a whore.

One of them called me that… The night they…

I dove deeper.

Complexity made my thoughts so heavy they pushed me to the bottom of the lake.

But no matter how much weight of the water pushed down on me from the surface, I still wanted Emmett to kiss me and I _hated_ myself for desiring that.

However, if I kissed him just out of sheer curiosity for the way his lips would feel on mine…

It wasn't desire. It was _curiosity_. So I could justify it.

Right?

That's how I decided I was going to jump.

I unthreaded my arms from the soaking wet purple coat and dress, unbuttoning it down the front. I was thankful I didn't have to undress in front of him, though I still couldn't think about actually _being_ undressed in front of him as it was.

I decided to cross that bridge when it came, and again I justified myself by insisting there was no way I could swim or jump in that dress anyway.

Now, I could move my arms and legs wide to make snow angels in the icy water. I could move and swim and fly.

In all my nervousness, I began to feel… _freedom_ as I cut through the icy water.

Emmett's freedom was contagious.

I let myself swim for the first time in a very long time.

Without thinking so hard and so heavily, I swam in circles. I pushed through the water, I twisted and turned and flipped and darted through it with grace.

Then, I smiled as I came to the surface and I laid my dress and coat on the snowy bank.

"Come jump!" He called beckoning me up to stand beside him.

"Not a chance." I responded with a little nervous laugh though of course there was a chance and my resolve was growing weaker and weaker.

"Please! For me!" He requested.

Being undressed in the same lake was one thing, but being undressed next to each other was another. It was safe this far away, but…

"I think I'll stay right here." I gave him a smile, but it was no consolation prize.

He wanted me there.

_I_ wanted me there.

No more cat and mouse.

"You said you wanted things to change, but they won't if you don't jump." He spoke very bluntly, but also metaphorically and it made me clench my teeth together as I knew he was right.

One thing was for sure and that was he wouldn't let me play games with him.

He sensed my hesitation though with patience.

"You can trust me, Rosalie." He said genuinely, holding out his hand.

As much as I wanted to believe it though, I had doubts that were making my stomach heavy and weighing me down into the depths of the frozen water.

"I'll close my eyes." He swore, holding his hand over his eyes, but I could still see the boyish grin on his face that deepened the dimples on his cheeks.

I'd seen those dimples just once and I decided to place him into eternity. That decision was instant, and though he'd imagined I regretted it, I didn't.

Not one bit.

He knew my reservation, and so I hoped he'd do what I said. I was counting on it.

I bit my lip, growing weaker in my resolve, but it didn't mean my nerves weren't shot. I was a bundle of anxiousness, and my boundaries were being stretched.

"I can't see if you're coming or not." He emphasized his point of not being able to see me.

With a clench of my jaw, I scaled the cliff with swift intent.

At the end of my climb, I was able to see him inhale in a sort of anticipation.

He sensed me near.

"Keep. Your. Eyes. Closed." I ordered strongly before I pulled up the last bit before I could get my feet under me at the top of the cliff.

"I swear." Emmett had one hand over his eyes then extended the other out in front of him.

"Swear on something." I knew it was improper, but I also knew how seriously he'd take it.

"I swear on Dorothy." He did so without hesitation, rotating so his palm was upward to the ceiling.

With his own eyes closed, I was free to look at him and I did, my eyes dancing over his skin.

I purposely avoided looking… Well… _South_.

It was a feat to not give in to the temptation that I didn't understand or couldn't really process that seemed to call my eyes in the vulnerability of his underwear, but I was so entranced by how beautiful he was otherwise that I was easily distracted.

Not without much nervousness, I took his hand.

He inhaled, slow and deep and I watched the lovely curve of his mouth as he smiled a smile especially reserved for me.

"Keep them closed." I whispered again, guiding him forward a few steps.

He'd made the jump four or five times by now so he remembered perfectly the depth, but he let me guide him forward all the same.

With his eyes closed, I oddly felt… _safe_.

The world around us was far from silent, with birds and animals and the whispers of falling snow, but for the first time, my demons were silent.

My mind was clear and quiet.

I wasn't afraid.

I pulled his hand a little so that then we stood perfectly beside each other on the edge.

He kept his eyes closed and the hand that wasn't intertwined in mine over his eyes.

As I looked at him, I could see just how devoted he was to letting me trust him, to making me feel… _safe._

I took a deep breath.

My eyes danced over his bottom lip and I swallowed.

I didn't dare breathe as I tested myself, moving slowly forward, and just inches from jumping off my own cliff. I felt his slow, sweet breath on my mouth and I closed my eyes, and ever… so… slowly… began to rise to my tip toes.

"You're not gonna push me in are you?" Emmett broke my concentration and I returned to my spot beside him immediately, like I'd been caught doing something I wasn't supposed to.

He really had no idea I was going to kiss him.

That irrationally pleased me.

"No." I said, and grinned like I hadn't grinned in quite a while before I tightened my grip on his hand.

"On the count of three then." He suggested the jump together, and at the signal, we both pushed off in a leap so glorious it'd bring shame to the Russian ballet.

In that moment, hanging in the sky, flying, we were infinite and the infinite didn't seem so oppressive.

In that moment, we weren't frozen like the lovers on Keats's Grecian Urn, doomed never to kiss - always to want, always to need.

I looked over in this moment, seeing his eyes still tightly closed and an exhilarated grin stretching across his face.

_I loved him._

Before this realization could truly sink in, we landed in the water together in perfect unison, and together we emerged.


	16. No Choir (Part II)

_"And, oddly enough, he needs me, too. That part worked out better than I could have hoped." - Rosalie, Eclipse, p. 165 (Stephenie Meyer)_

Quick note: Thanks for your kind, insightful words! As promised, here's a second part to the chapter. I appreciate your patience as I get back into a routine with school and mental health care. I really value your kindness and your reviews! Thank you for investing in me and this story!

In this chapter, I get to some action that isn't entirely character driven, but it definitely is a big chapter for character development. I still touch on some struggles that Rosalie has with her sexuality, and I lightly reference Emmett's own relationship to sex as escapism here, but will unpack that further in future chapters. With some references to angst, and some long awaited fluff, there's some light humor also sprinkled into this chapter.

ALSO IMPORTANT INFO: This song at the top of the chapter is the one that I relate to the most in my own life, but also I find the most relevant to this story and to Rosalie's experience in particular. "The loneliness never left me. I always took it with me, but I can put it down in the pleasure of your company." Since the first time I read Twilight I always felt a deep understanding of Rosalie and maybe I projected myself onto her... But I just really appreciate having this outlet to cope with the darkness in my life and to create on a character by Stephenie Meyer that I have such a strong love and perceived understanding of.

Please consider leaving a review! Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

TW/CW: language, sexual themes

* * *

**_No Choir_**

_And it's hard to write about being happy_

_'Cause the older I get_

_I find that happiness is an extremely uneventful subject_

_And there would be no grand choirs to sing_

_No chorus could come in_

_About two people sitting doing nothing_

_But I must confess_

_I did it all for myself_

_I gathered you here to hide from some vast unnameable fear_

_But the loneliness never left me_

_I always took it with me_

_But I can put it down in the pleasure of your company_

_And there will be no grand choirs to sing_

_No chorus will come in_

_No ballad will be written_

_It will be entirely forgotten_

_And if tomorrow it's all over_

_At least we had it for a moment_

_Oh, darling, things seem so unstable_

_But for a moment we were able to be still_

* * *

**Emmett**

The water parted around us, like a curtain opening for a performance - a new act, one never seen before.

I'd thought Rosalie was beautiful before, but now, with my eyes closed, she was exquisite.

I inhaled at the weight of her arms around my neck, sensing her close to me in a way that made me shiver.

I imagined the look on her face in this moment, the way her eyes would examine my face in a way that gathered data for her own private analysis.

I imagined the way she'd pout her bottom lip, the way her perfect brow would furrow the way she'd privately decide something I couldn't understand.

Nothing could have prepared me for what happened next as she traced her fingers through my hair. I felt her take a deep breath, her hands interlacing at the base of my neck.

"Rosalie." I said her name just to say it, in a reverent worship of it.

"You can open your eyes." She said softly, her voice sounding like a chorus of bells.

I was in awe as she said these simple words, letting me see her…

Rosalie's perfect, beautiful form was trembling so it displaced the water around our physical forms even before I opened my eyes.

I knew just how important it was to keep my eyes locked into hers. I half wondered if it was some sort of test, to see if I would be up to the challenge of keeping my gaze off of her in her underwear.

Just the thought made my knees weak, and as I opened my eyes something in my gaze locking immediately into her eyes made her sharply inhale and smile a little at me.

I was still as in awe of her now as I was the day she'd saved me in the woods.

At the meeting of our eyes, Rosalie tensed up in my arms and I worried this was the beginning stages of her pulling away from me.

I touched her face with tenderness, as if asking her to stay close.

And, so she did, her eyes analyzing my gaze as if she was looking for something.

My eyes danced over her mouth, wondering…

She parted her lips lightly and I closed the gap between us, satisfying the desire to know her body by putting a hand at her waist.

Something filled her gaze I didn't understand, and her eyes darted down, but she didn't pull away.

Just like that jump, I couldn't hold back anymore, and I knew that's what she saw in my eyes.

Something was still holding back in her eyes though, still hanging in the air, refusing to believe that at some point… She'd crash into the water below.

"That was fun." I grinned excitedly. "Tell me you had fun."

Rosalie giggled, biting her perfect bottom lip.

I wondered…

"I had fun." She appeased me.

"Let's do it a thousand more times." I insisted, looking over her face wanting to believe there was something genuine in it.

"You won't get tired of it?" She raised an eyebrow, a sparkle in her eye that suggested she wasn't talking about the jump.

She was talking about herself.

"No." I smiled. "I could never."

Rosalie seemed lightly happy that she and I floated in this sort of bliss, recounted by the icy water around us and between us. We played effortlessly with one another, laughing and splashing through the water. She was confident in a way that she wasn't out of this lake.

My dead heart raced in my chest and I thought briefly about what it was like to be afraid… How it felt radiating through my fingers and through every fiber of my limbs. How it climbed up my throat and tightened all my muscles.

I thought about the first early summer storm I could remember. I thought about the rain, how hard it came down - the way the wind howled…

I thought about babies crying and how I'd climbed under the sheets, imagining they were some sort of fortress.

Someone might say I never grew out of climbing under the sheets whenever there was something I didn't want to face outside of them…

But right now, I couldn't think about being afraid and I wasn't _immediately_ thinking about climbing under the sheets, not as I floated in this lake and in Rosalie's beautiful golden eyes.

I tethered myself to the present reality by tightening my arm around her waist.

"I can see every color in your eyes." I exhaled.

There were colors I didn't have names for sparkling through her irises, and as she looked at me, I thought about the calm before the storm, the way the air thickened.

Right now, the air was so thick it stretched through my throat and inflated my lungs.

I had to touch her.

So I did.

I reached out and traced my thumb across her cheekbone.

My eyes darted to her mouth, tempted by the curve of it as I was shot straight through with Cupid's arrow.

I wanted to kiss her.

I touched her face, trying to keep my fingers light and easy on her skin as I looked desperately into her eyes, wanting to see that she wanted me to kiss her.

My nerves were live wires and every sensory point on my fingers felt her.

However, I still wanted her closer. I still wanted to feel her.

More of her.

It felt like thirst, unquenchable thirst the way it burned through my entire body.

"Rosalie…" I started again, but this time my voice shook with undeniable nervousness like I was just thirteen and unsure again.

But now… I was twenty and unsure.

"Yes?" I watched her eyes dart to my mouth.

I noticed.

She stepped backward, shifting her weight.

Something in her golden eyes was wary, almost afraid and they darted down as she bit her lip.

She crossed her arm over her shoulder as if she was going to hide herself from me.

I desperately hoped she wouldn't.

"I was thinking about what you said." I began again, my head spinning.

"What about?" She looked back up at me, and I saw the weight of her thoughts on her face.

I took a deep breath, her scent of roses and honey braiding through my senses so I stepped forward, putting my hands on her again.

She inhaled, her eyes darting over my face, looking for something I hoped she'd find.

Still though, she trembled under my gaze.

"There's some things you'll miss out on not being human… But, not all of it." I said, worshipping the glory of her with my gaze.

I touched her like some sort of religious sacrament of devotion.

She looked up into my eyes, receiving my exaltation.

She knew I was sincere.

And now, I tried to say what I wanted to earlier, but I was too nervous to.

I was chicken before, but I was still nervous now.

"Because… well…" I willed my voice to stop shaking.

Then, she exhaled, melting into my hand on her face and that was all the confidence I needed.

"What you said, about your friend Vera… How… you were jealous of her…"

Rosalie's eyes darted over mine swiftly, searching and a little defensive.

"I…_ I_ can kiss you like that…" I traced my thumb over her perfect bottom lip, tingling at the thought of touching my lips to hers.

"Like you wanted." I promised, seeing something shoot across her eyes like a shooting star.

Time moved so slowly that I drank in every detail with pristine meticulousness.

The way she looked at me, the open vastness of her eyes, the thickening Alaskan air, the snow falling in a whisper and collecting in sparkling dust on her skin and in her wet golden hair against the pink, rising sun.

Her eyes were like the universe then, and I was just a small speck of dust within it.

She was everything, and I was nothing.

Then, everything changed.

"Emmett?" She began, her voice around my name such a beautiful sound.

I inhaled her, wanting to taste every word coming out of her mouth.

"I will still want it… _All _of it." Her voice trembled, like a hummingbird's wings through the air. "And I won't ever not want more than what this life can give me…"

"I know." I exhaled, hearing what she didn't say.

She won't ever not want more than what _I _could give her.

Tragically, she looked at me, desperation in her eyes and vulnerability painting her skin.

"But, I still want you to give you everything I can." I told her plainly letting her know I read between the lines.

I trailed off, sounding much more confident than I felt. That's when a door opened in her eyes.

I saw exactly who I was like her irises were mirrors.

And, I wasn't a small speck of dust.

I was a universe too.

I felt the weight of this information in her eyes, the truth of it.

I saw thousands of years in her. I felt millions of stories on her skin, just waiting to be made.

That's when she reached to kiss me on the cheek just as she had before, but it was all different now.

Because we were different.

Everything was different.

I tilted my chin down and closed my eyes, feeling her sigh.

Her breath was sweet in the air between us.

Her lips left a trail of fire from my cheek as they skimmed over my skin and finally to the corner of my mouth.

I turned, pausing over her lips as I inhaled in anticipation, hanging on the moment.

In this second, I knew once we kissed, the world as I knew it would cease to exist. The planets would realign. The stars would reorganize. The sun would shine differently. I would be tethered, mind, body, and soul to _her_.

And, s_he_ would be _mine_.

Without a grand choir or fanfare, the world rearranged.

At the softest touch of her lips to mine, the universe began.

It was soft as summer rain, and warm like afternoon sunshine so I melted into the kiss that restarted my dead heart.

Desperate need overtook my body like a deeper instinct than hunting.

She felt it and she braided her fingers through my hair, holding my lips to hers in a new kind of kiss, less reserved, more wanting.

I smiled against her mouth and tightened my hand at her waist ever so slightly, pulling her closer.

I was absolutely magnetized to her.

A sensation shot through my body, energizing me, as she parted her lips to ask me to deepen the kiss.

Every sensory point in my body was on fire.

I breathed her in.

The _way_ she kissed me…

Both my hands came to her face as we deepened the kiss. I extended my fingers through her hair and down the back of her long beautiful neck.

I longed to keep her close like I'd never longed for anything.

She sighed into my mouth, allowing a more intimate kiss and a chill to run down my spine.

I was overcome then, feeling her give in to me and I thought for a moment I was imagining the whole thing.

We both pulled away only to look at each other for a brief moment, both of us checking that impossibly - this was all real and that we were still each other.

The stars in her eyes darted over mine, creating a thousand new constellations.

I'd lost myself in a lot of women before. I'd felt a lot of women try to lose themselves in me, but this… right now… with Rosalie was different.

We weren't trying to lose anything.

Rosalie kissed me with the desire to experience me, to know me, to discover me… And, she touched me with the desire to be discovered herself. Rosalie wanted me to know her, and she wanted to know herself.

We were found.

Then, she smiled, a girlish, happy grin as she lifted her chin to kiss me again, this time both of us approaching more confidently as my hands traced down her shoulders and my fingers spread over her back.

Her skin was silk and her body was perfect.

She felt… Oh, she felt…

Damn.

Instinct took over as I touched her and she responded by drawing closer and closer to me.

The most natural thing was to touch her.

With a light press of my left hand at the curve of her spine, she arched her back into me under the water.

God. In. Heaven.

She curved her arms around my neck so I was acutely aware of her body on the front surface of mine.

She kissed me in a way that was all at once a fireworks display and a silent snowfall.

Then, in a smooth, seamless motion we were entangled; I'd almost forgotten we were undressed, the water making our clothes cling to our bodies to the point that very little was left to the imagination as it was.

I felt her. The hourglass of her waist. The shape of her hips.

I felt her bare back, the clasp of her bra…

_Fuck._

I tilted my chin down and away.

I couldn't.

"Don't." Rosalie whispered, but in her voice was pleading and it set me on fire.

I searched through her eyes, seeing something in them that was like a fire starting from smoldering embers. A vulnerability and softness filled her gaze that she invited me into and as she parted her lips, her eyes darted to my mouth again.

"Are you sure?" I asked her.

I knew Rosalie was raised proper so she had to understand…

This wasn't just kissing. We'd passed that.

She didn't respond, but she reached to guide my chin back that so my lips were claimed by hers once again.

I wanted her.

It felt like the only thing I ever wanted.

My mind twisted around the idea that she impossibly wanted me too.

The way she kissed me proved it.

I was going to spontaneously combust. I felt my want for her transforming into need in my center.

Our kiss gained speed, a sort of desperation to it as our hands grasped at each other.

The heat of it made me feel like I was impossibly sweating.

I pushed forward so that her back came in contact with the rocks of the cliff and my hands came to either side of her shoulders.

She gasped at the contact, but pulled me closer, hungry.

I kissed down her neck, and she exhaled dreamily into the autumn air.

My lips found her collarbone and I began to think about the strap of her light pink bra as it sat on her otherwise bare shoulder.

She shivered against my lips and wound her arms under my shoulders, pulling me closer.

Her fingers spread across the planes of my back.

_Shit._

I returned to her lips, kissing her as she should've been kissed.

Rosalie's left leg rose ever so slightly, but it was enough to send things over a new edge as I pulled on her thigh to latch it at my hip.

I could please her. I knew I could.

I couldn't control my mind then and I imagined the way she'd sound when she'd purr…

That's when I caught her eyes for a moment, and if I'd been thinking clearly I might've recognized that look in her eyes. I'd seen it before.

In all the women who wanted to lose themselves in me.

I was thirsty for her, but underneath it all I knew this in my subconscious and it made me uneasy.

I didn't want her to be lost. I'd just found her.

Rosalie pulled me closer, and my weight settled between her legs. At this shift, she gasped, pushing me off of her in a panic.

I froze, taking stock of her abruptness, having felt the change in her tangibly.

Her eyes went down and away as she crossed her arms over her chest, holding her shoulders shyly as if it was so I couldn't look at her.

I felt her cross her legs against me under the water, fidgeting

"Is everything okay?" I asked, concern filling my tone evidently.

"We should go." She suggested, keeping her beautiful eyes away from me.

She denied my gaze, stiffening in a way that I didn't understand.

"Yeah, gimme a second." I cleared my throat and turned my back trying to think of anything in this world but her as I attempted to manage the incredibly obvious signal of how much I desired her in the front of my pants.

Undoubtedly… She'd felt it.

I took a deep breath, but nothing could come to mind but the perfection that had been those moments tangled up with her, so there was no hope for letting it die.

I couldn't help but watch her as she awkwardly and impossibly tried to put on her wet purple dress again without getting out of the water so I'd see her body…

Rosalie wrung out her hair in a puddle beside her on the water's edge once she'd managed to shimmy back into her dress.

Her perfect lips were pursed and there was the slightest furrow to her brow.

I tried unsuccessfully to keep my eyes off of her so I could focus, but it was no use.

I wondered how long I'd have to wait in this lake before it'd be suitable to go get my clothes, and I got nervous and impatient as she began the walk back home without even a glance in my direction.

That was finally enough to kill it, and I practically jumped into my clothes, what was left of them anyway to catch her stride.

She kept her gaze low and her arms crossed over her chest as she walked home removed from me.

"I…" I started but I didn't know what I was going to say.

She clenched her jaw, uncomfortableness radiating off of her in an aura.

_Damn it all to hell. _

I had to be bold and take a chance.

"Well, um… that was sure some kiss." I finally said, running my hand through my hair nervously.

She didn't say anything, but her fingers traced across her lips absent-mindedly.

"Right?" I tried to hide my pathetic need for validation in this, but it was obvious I needed her to tell me she felt the same way.

Rosalie looked like a totally different person in this moment than she had just moments ago telling me not to pull away from her.

Not to deny her…

I didn't understand her now…

I wanted to, but I couldn't.

She'd been unrestrained just minutes ago… Now, she'd retreated.

Rosalie kept one of her hands at her mouth like she did when she was nervous, tracing over her bottom lip again and again.

She didn't answer and I sighed, reverting to joking when dealing with something difficult of course.

"I guess it's a good thing my confidence isn't that fragile." I jabbed at her teasingly, watching her eyes for clues. "Or my masculinity."

The corner of her mouth turned up, but it didn't touch her eyes.

Every stupid insecurity I never even dreamed of having before crept in then.

I ran a hand through my hair.

Her eyes were widened then in what looked like… _fear_.

I hoped I was misreading her.

She sighed, crossing her arms and keeping her gaze down.

"What's wrong?"

I tried not to sound panicked.

"Nothing." She mumbled in a way that was obvious she didn't mean that.

I waited then, wondering if it'd be too much to take her hand.

The way she gripped her arms told me she definitely didn't entertain the thought of touching as we walked back to the others.

Her shoulders hunched forward like she wanted to be invisible.

I worried irrationally about all the stupid things I could be insecure about like what if she didn't like kissing me, what if I'd done something she didn't like, what if I'd been too forward, what if she didn't really think about me romantically, what if I disgusted her, but then my mind settled on the worst thing I could entertain at the time.

What if she'd felt me, hard against her, and thought I was over eager or inexperienced since I'd gotten turned on by just a little passionate necking. What if she didn't find it appropriate. What if… she found the thought of me disgusting.

Holy fucking shit.

I ran a hand through my hair, nervous like an early teenager, for the first time totally speechless around her.

It was too much of a coincidence that the moment she could feel me between her legs, she pushed me away.

As an early teenager, I got hard at just about anything. I'd smell perfume. I'd watch Dolly Reed washing clothes in the river. I'd hear Edie Green's laugh. I got too excited about a rainstorm. I won a fight. I could look at a _tree_ the wrong way, and I'd hunker over, embarrassed.

I'd thought something was wrong with me, something was broken because I was so easily aroused. Obviously, I didn't understand that I was just a teenaged boy.

The first time I'd ever kissed a girl, _really_ kissed a girl I was thirteen. I remembered the discomfort, the awkwardness, the way I'd squirmed to try to adjust myself so she wouldn't notice my premature erection. I remembered the mortification I felt when she noticed, but because she was older and more experienced, she let me _know_ she noticed by diving her hand down the front of my pants.

I didn't stand a chance.

I'd been inexperienced and easily turned on before. It'd been awkward and inconvenient and God…. I couldn't imagine being that stupidly insecure again.

I _wasn't _that stupidly insecure anymore.

I knew what I was doing. I was assured. But, every bit of my assuredness went out the window in Rosalie's presence.

She was… everything.

Her back, arched against those rocks and her leg snaking around my waist…

God fucking damn it, just thinking about it was making me hard again and I looked away taking a deep breath, but it was a terrible idea because her glorious fragrance of roses and honey was still in the air, especially as she was still all wet…

Shit shit shit shit shit.

I was hopeless.

I thought I was starting to get a hang of this whole vampire thing, and I was able to focus a lot more easily on one subject instead of letting all the information and external stimuli come in at once, but with Rosalie…

With Rosalie, it was like I'd woken anew. Every sense was heightened every emotional experience was on overdrive. Every bit of information my senses took in raced through my veins.

I took an awkward step out of my usual stride using this as a way to adjust myself inconspicuously.

Then, as if on cue Rosalie giggled nervously and my eyes darted over toward her. It'd bubbled up her throat as she looked away from me, avoiding my eyes.

I looked over at her, unable to imagine being more mortified than I was in this moment.

Any trace of a hard on was long gone now.

Then, she laughed again, a little less restrained.

I was flooded with unshakeable awkwardness and I clenched my jaw too afraid to ask.

This time, her laugh was far less restrained and she fully tossed her head back in one of the most glorious sounds I'd ever heard.

Even if I did imagine it was at my expense.

"What?" I prompted, nervous.

"What were you just thinking?" She turned toward me, a flicker of amusement in her gaze.

"Nothing. I wasn't thinking about anything. Nothing." I cleared my throat defensively, unable to imagine telling her.

"Because whatever it was sent Edward running." The corner of her mouth turned up, and my eyes darted toward the horizon where the house was beginning to come into focus.

I saw a copy of Paradise Lost lying open in the snow, the pages still fluttering like bird's wings in the wind. It'd just been left freshly and Edward's shoes barely made a print in the snow he'd run so fast from what he'd imagined was some peace and quiet to read in the sunrise.

Whoops.

"Well, shit." I laughed throatily as I imagined subjecting Edward to my inner monologue about erections.

Rosalie exhaled, but wasn't full of humor. She still remained heavy.

"You sure it wasn't what _you_ were thinking?" I teased lightly, my nature allowing me to easily depart from overthinking.

"I'm sure." Rosalie was as icy as the air around us, staying distant.

"Would you tell me what's on your mind then?" I pushed, wanting to know how she felt, but not wanting to be too pathetic.

It was too late though. I was already a crumb.

I was brought back to reality then in a harsh, crashing lurch.

"What happened?" Esme's eyes were the first to find us, full of worry, full of desperate anxiousness as she stood on the back porch.

I took a deep breath, about to speak, then I noticed her eyes were on Rosalie, taking her in with motherly protectiveness.

Esme was visibly distraught and she reached out as if Rosalie would actually go to her.

But, as I'd anticipated, Rosalie remained.

However… the way she remained was different. She wasn't denying Esme's affection and love. She remained by _me_.

As a sort of signal that… we stood together.

"Everything's fine." Rosalie assured her with a little smile.

Esme communicated her worry with the way her eyes darted over our disheveled clothes and our soaking hair.

"You've been gone for three days." Esme said, reminding us of the passage of time.

It had felt like years, but also mere seconds.

This information tethered us to the present.

"I'm sorry." Rosalie mumbled.

"It was my fault." I tried to absolve her.

Esme's eyes darted to me, her brow slightly furrowed.

"You've hunted." Esme exhaled.

I nodded.

"It was my idea." Rosalie stood up for me in a reverse of how I'd stood up for her.

"That was extremely dangerous, Rosalie, he could've…" Esme argued with concern.

"But, he didn't." Rosalie retorted.

Esme exhaled, genuinely seeming emotional about our extended absence.

I didn't understand it.

The look in her eye was desperately worried.

"I'm sorry." I said and I think I meant it.

I definitely wasn't sorry for being with Rosalie, but I think I was sorry for how it had worried Esme.

"We're just glad you're home safely." Carlisle's voice came from behind Esme as he stepped forward from the house.

He put his hand on Esme's shoulder in quiet, loving confidence, but he kept his eyes on me.

I swallowed nervously feeling my stomach drop in a way I hated.

Carlisle's gaze held me captive and his power radiated from his being like an aura.

His authority was different than any I'd experienced before, but it was authority nonetheless and made me uneasy. I retreated back into myself, looking down and away from him.

"Emmett." Carlisle began. "I'd like to talk with you."


	17. No Choir (Part III)

_"And, oddly enough, he needs me, too. That part worked out better than I could have hoped." - Rosalie, Eclipse, p. 165 (Stephenie Meyer)_

Quick note: Thanks for your kind, insightful words! I don't feel like I deserve your compliments, but it makes my day to see how you respond. Here's a short part three that touches on illuminating the other half of last chapter. It's actually one of the first bits of this story I wrote and built around. I used my personal experience and feelings to craft some of this chapter, but did some research on expanding to truly be representative of what Rosalie's going through in her psyche. I wanted to truly do her character and what she represents to me justice as well as show her voice and motivations throughout their physical interaction. I feel like this is one of the climaxes of Rosalie's internal experience and it was definitely difficult to write because of the content hitting really hard, but I do appreciate your patience as I get back into a routine with school and mental health care. I really value your kindness and your reviews! Thank you for investing in me and this story!

Side note: I don't think I was very clear in the last chapter that Edward wasn't spying on them, he was just reading outside to get some mental peace and quiet and as Emmett and Rosalie returned home, they 'ran in to each other' unexpectedly. Also, no, Emmett is still unaware of what happened to Rosalie. He's got pieces of information, but nothing concrete. That conversation is coming... So is a chapter with Dorothy. Get ready ;)

ALSO IMPORTANT INFO: This song at the top of the chapter is the one that I relate to the most in my own life, but also I find the most relevant to this story and to Rosalie's experience in particular. "The loneliness never left me. I always took it with me, but I can put it down in the pleasure of your company." Since the first time I read Twilight I always felt a deep understanding of Rosalie and maybe I projected myself onto her... But I just really appreciate having this outlet to cope with the darkness in my life and to create on a character by Stephenie Meyer that I have such a strong love and perceived understanding of.

Please consider leaving a review! Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

TW/CW: PTSD, sexual assault, sexual themes

* * *

**_No Choir_**

_And it's hard to write about being happy_

_'Cause the older I get_

_I find that happiness is an extremely uneventful subject_

_And there would be no grand choirs to sing_

_No chorus could come in_

_About two people sitting doing nothing_

_But I must confess_

_I did it all for myself_

_I gathered you here to hide from some vast unnameable fear_

_But the loneliness never left me_

_I always took it with me_

_But I can put it down in the pleasure of your company_

_And there will be no grand choirs to sing_

_No chorus will come in_

_No ballad will be written_

_It will be entirely forgotten_

_And if tomorrow it's all over_

_At least we had it for a moment_

_Oh, darling, things seem so unstable_

_But for a moment we were able to be still_

* * *

**Rosalie**

I bloomed like a flower in early spring as he showered me with the sort of devotion they wrote poems about.

My heart was all at once heavy and lightened in my chest. But mostly, I felt calm.

So I pressed my lips lightly to his cheek, his skin feeling like satin against my lips.

He was sweet, tilting his chin down slightly, so that I felt his openness… Now, he was asking for mine.

I thought about taking the jump from the cliff, the way the wind rushed around my skin the exhilaration of hanging in the air with him.

Now, there was a similar feeling in my stomach and a clarity to my mind.

So I paused, hanging on the moment hovering over his lips and I felt it all.

I felt everything.

But, I still wanted to feel _him_.

So, with the softness of the falling snow, I touched my lips to his.

The smallest spark lit the fire of a thousand suns in a million different celestial galaxies and I felt us begin to float in the zero gravity, the only thing holding us to the earth being one another.

So, I clutched him closer braiding my fingers in his curls to make sure he didn't float away. His hand tightened at my waist, anchoring me here.

I needed him like I'd never needed anything.

As his hands came to my face, cradling it like it was the most important thing he'd ever held, I finally felt whole.

I sighed into his mouth, and he dissolved into me. It took me higher to have him merged with me, somewhere beyond all understanding. He felt it too.

We pulled away, and our eyes met in an otherworldly way, communicating a thousand epics.

I'd never felt this way before.

It was like I'd discovered I could speak a language I didn't know was always deep within my soul. No one else could speak it, except… Emmett.

Actually, it was more like there was this ancient dialect on my skin that no one else could translate, not even me.

But, he could.

Oh, he could.

At this revelation, I wanted to find out more.

I wanted him to tell me.

I needed him to tell me.

God, I was desperate.

I wanted to know myself, my body, my mind, my spirit.

I wanted to know.

His hand pressed at the base of my spine and my body listened. I was acutely aware of his skin on mine and I felt his assuredness.

I wound my arms around his neck, breathing him in, each new touch of our skins enlightening another bit of my mind.

We communicated through the surfaces of our body, and I wanted to know him more and more so I tangled myself up in him.

But, the more I tangled myself in him, the more I seemed to awaken _myself_.

It felt like my body was yawning, stretching from being asleep, like I'd been caged in a space too small for me and now I was finally free to expand.

Then, he pulled away, or something pushed him away.

He turned his cheek.

I was desperate.

I'd been isolated for so long, that his touch awakened me.

My loneliness…

"Don't." I begged him.

Just as I was starting to feel… Just as I was starting to know…

"Are you sure?" He asked me, his velvet voice dropping low.

Despite his closeness, it sounded like he was thousands of miles away and all I could think of was my emptiness and my need.

I was still hungry, so I reached for him again.

I needed him closer.

I was addicted.

I wondered if this was what it was like to drink human blood, the indulgence of it all, the dire desperation.

It was like I was running then, running toward something that was getting further and further away.

The only satisfaction was the way I grasped for him.

For myself.

I was diving deeper, and deeper and deeper, and soon I would reach what I longed for.

I could barely feel the contact of my back with the rocks of the cliff, but I gasped into him, wanting to inhale him.

Every detail of Emmett's skin on mine was racing through my mind. I thought about the places he touched me in excruciating detail.

In a surreal almost daydream, I imagined my skin was turning red as blood and dissolving into the water everywhere he _hadn't_ touched me. I needed him to hold me together. I wanted him to understand.

_I_ _needed_ to understand.

As he kissed down my neck, his body departed from mine and I was going to fall to pieces.

The spots where he left my skin felt like they were going to fall off and wash away in the water.

In a panic, I wound my arms under his shoulders, pulling his body closer to mine.

I needed to feel his weight. I needed him to touch every single part of me that had been touched before.

To erase.

Erase…

I desperately spread my fingers over his back, terrified that I was falling apart and all those rotten pieces of me were just dissolving into the lake.

He'd see.

He'd know.

I needed him to hold me together.

I needed him to touch me faster so I wouldn't fall apart.

Emmett's touch felt healing, and I was selfishly exploiting it.

I latched my leg at his hip, feeling him on my inner thighs and knowing I'd felt a man there before.

I'd been hurt there before.

I needed Emmett to keep erasing where Royce and those monsters had touched me. I needed a new memory written into my skin. I needed it.

I was hungry.

Emmett pulled away to find my eyes and he was obviously looking for something because his focus darted back down before he kissed me again.

He'd slowed, as if he sensed my need for him and it was too much for him to bear.

I couldn't accept that. It terrified me.

He was more reticent in perfect proportion with the way I made my desperation known.

I wanted to be his, and no one else's. If I was his, my body could forget.

If my body was his, it wasn't Royce's.

If my body was his...

I could change.

I could move on.

It'd all be erased…

If I was his, I'd stop being theirs…

That's when I felt him between my legs, the weight, the angle, the way his hands laid on my skin, the way he exhaled into me… S_omething_ I'd felt too closely before triggered a deep reflexive response, and I came back into my body with a startling gasp.

I'd been set alight, my skin burning and charring at the residue of his touch. All of them.

I felt it all over again.

I relived that evening in the streets of Rochester in a matter of milliseconds, but didn't spare a detail.

With the abruptness of a gunshot, all the pain, suffering, and isolation came rushing back in, but the worst of it… Oh the worst of it was the way Emmett looked at me now as I experienced a liminal space between what Royce and those men had done to me, and what Emmett and I had just done.

He looked over me with wide, concerned eyes, like I was some sort of broken winged bird.

Immediately, I wanted to cover myself.

I imagined my body as it was in the streets of Rochester.

I was horrid.

It was like he could see my red, ugly skin that had been so horribly abused. No matter what Emmett did, it remained.

No matter how deeply he kissed me. No matter how close he held me. No matter how much he made me feel… impossibly… _loved_….

It remained.

I was so stupid to imagine he was erasing what had happened.

It couldn't be erased.

"Is everything okay?" He asked me, full of worry.

No.

Nothing was okay.

And it would never be okay.

I was ruined.

I was garbage.

I wasn't a woman.

I had no sexuality. I had no identity. I had nothing.

"We should go." I panicked, feeling blind because I didn't see the world we'd created together before.

It was all crumbling down now. The wallpaper was peeling off of the earth.

Its ugliness was exposed.

Just like my own.

"Yeah, gimme a second." He cleared his throat, turning his back to me.

Shame ate away at my center and I clutched my shoulders tightly.

I was… dirty.

And though Emmett tried, he couldn't erase what they'd done to me.

It was too deeply etched into my skin, into my psyche.

I went through the motions as I'd done the first few months of being a newborn, and before my numb mind could catch up to my numb body, I noticed I'd started walking home as Emmett caught my stride.

"I…" He began, but there was nothing he could say.

I clenched my jaw, willing myself to be invisible as he searched my face for clues.

"Well, um… that was sure some kiss." He said, running his hand through his messy hair.

My stomach dropped and my fingers reached to trace across my lips unconsciously.

"Right?" He was checking.

I don't know what it had been.

At first it'd been a kiss…

But, then it became something else.

It was like I couldn't even remember it because it didn't really happen to me, but… it _did _because I still felt it throbbing on my lips and across my skin like a bruise.

"I guess it's a good thing my confidence isn't that fragile." He tried to lighten his tone, but it was still probing. "Or my masculinity."

The corner of my mouth turned up at this. I was supposed to be amused.

I went through the motions.

I was out of control.

The world was dimming and I could only see a pinhole of light around him.

I looked over at him, terrified I was going to mess things up because I was so broken and ruined and horrible.

He was the only thing I had any faith in anymore so why… why did I still feel so… dirty?

Why did I have to push him away? Everything was fine… Until it wasn't.

I felt guilty, showing him my brokenness, not even being able to kiss him properly.

Why couldn't I separate what those men had done to me and what Emmett and I wanted to do now?

I did want to kiss him. I _did_ want to.

I didn't feel pressured or manipulated or taken advantage of.

My mind had been clear. I _wanted_ to kiss him.

But, still I faltered.

I sighed, crossing my arms.

"What's wrong?" He asked me, snapping me from my darkness.

I was surprised he could still see me as I disintegrated.

"Nothing." My voice was a little too high pitched.

He saw through me, frowning a little.

His instinct was to touch me and that was obvious with the way his hands twitched to reach for me.

I gripped my arms tighter, feeling like I was a live wire that could electrocute him with just a little proximity.

Something was running through his mind that troubled him. It troubled him so much that it read obviously in his eyes and the way he carried himself. His boyishness shone through in this insecurity. Insecurity I'd never known he could have.

He absolutely vibrated with pent up energy, and it was infecting the air. He was… nervous.

I kept my gaze away from him, but I could sense it.

Something was heavy on his mind.

I worried that he knew. I worried he'd put the pieces together.

He sighed, awkwardly stepping outside of his stride in a way that took him further from me.

I looked toward the horizon seeing a flash of copper hair, a book stuck in the air before gravity caught up with it.

Edward.

I was mortified then at all I was thinking so candidly. Embarrassed didn't even cover it, so I giggled under my breath.

Emmett looked over, his eyes wide.

It made me feel even more nervous and awkward and ill-fit, so I laughed a little less restrained.

"What?" Emmett's voice held a little panic.

This was my chance.

"What were you just thinking?" I asked, trying to show my amusement over my panic.

"Nothing. I wasn't thinking about anything. Nothing." He cleared his throat, his panic outweighing mine in this moment, so I felt my panic begin to subside.

"Because whatever it was sent Edward running." I pulled the corner of my mouth up, trying desperately to return to how everything was before…

I was too heavy though.

I exhaled.

As Emmett took stock of Edward's escape, I watched his eyes, seeing humor light up in them.

"You sure it wasn't what _you_ were thinking?" He teased, the dimples on his cheeks making me weak at the knees so I had to look away.

"I'm sure." I said icily.

"Would you tell me what's on your mind then?" He asked with anticipation.

I wouldn't tell him.

I felt guilty. I wanted to give him who I was before.

But, I couldn't.

Because I wasn't her anymore.

I couldn't charm him with my smile because my smile was taken.

I couldn't flirt with clever things from my mind because it was infected.

I couldn't bat my violet, sparkling eyes at him, because they'd been beaten in and now, though they were golden, all they saw was darkness.

I couldn't kiss him with my lips, touch him with my fingers, or give him my body... Because it had all been taken from me.


	18. Big God (Part I)

_"And, oddly enough, he needs me, too. That part worked out better than I could have hoped." - Rosalie, Eclipse, p. 165 (Stephenie Meyer)_

Quick note: Thanks for your reviews and encouragement! I truly don't feel like I deserve your meaningful compliments, but it makes my day to see how you respond. This conversation between Emmett and Carlisle has been foreshadowed since the beginning and I feel it is incredibly important in their individual developments and ultimately the development of what it will mean to Carlisle to be a "leader" as he became in the canon saga. I do appreciate your patience as I get back into a routine with school and mental health care. I really value your kindness and your reviews! Thank you for investing in me and this story!

Side note: Next chapter is a part two viewing Esme and Rosalie's exchange that I also consider extremely instrumental in this sort of parallel structure. A chapter with Dorothy is in the works of course... Lots coming up soon!

Please consider leaving a review! Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

TW/CW: Reference to abuse and suicide

* * *

**_Big God_**

_Well, you can never know_  
_The places that I go_  
_I still like you the most_  
_You'll always be my favorite ghost_

_You need a big god_  
_Big enough to hold your love_  
_You need a big god_  
_Big enough to fill you up_

_Sometimes I think it's gettin' better_  
_And then it gets much worse_  
_Is it just part of the process?_  
_Well, Jesus Christ, it hurts_  
_Though I know I should know better_  
_Well, I can make this work_  
_Is it just part of the process?_  
_Well, Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ, it hurts_

* * *

**Carlisle**

I watched him change. Like a beaten dog, he bowed his head and turned away from me even as he walked toward me.

It wasn't guilt that filled his eyes after I spoke. It was something else. It was some sort of acknowledgment of his perceived inferiority and worthiness of punishment.

It was peculiar.

Rosalie watched him tragically, something in her eyes I didn't understand, but it broke my heart nonetheless.

He looked back at her before he passed through the threshold with me, but in that instance, she avoided his eyes. Rosalie kept her arms tightly crossed over her chest, one of her hands lifted so her fingers could trace across her lips nervously.

I reached to put my hand on Emmett's back in a sort of gesture of good will, but he tensed up so I knew it wasn't well received and I put my arm back down by my side instead.

That's when I smelled her on him.

My eyes darted back to Rosalie, seeing her nervousness in an entirely new light. It was obvious they'd been physically close even aside from their dishevelment and the smell of her on his skin.

They wore heaviness that pinpointed a significant change. _Something_ had changed.

But, it was far from the smitten first sparks of new romance though.

It was the painful friction of sharpening iron.

There was much to consider as they began their relationship with one another.

Esme's instinct was beyond all understanding and she'd already made it to Rosalie's side. She had felt the same compelling need to look out for Rosalie's best interest as we saw how spooked she looked right now.

It was hard to tell if she was spooked by Emmett or just situationally spooked. Regardless, I pinpointed the look in Rosalie's eyes finally. I realized that it had taken so long to identify because it wasn't something I saw in them often.

Rosalie was stubborn and didn't like acknowledging when she was wrong, but in this moment… She looked like she was harboring guilt. She looked like she felt shame…

She looked like she was _sorry_.

Rosalie had made it obvious and intentional the way she estranged from the rest of us, and I doubted she was sorry for taking Emmett hunting or staying gone for three days. She wasn't projecting that guilt in my direction or Esme's - rather Emmett's…

I wondered then, getting more and more confused.

I led Emmett into the house, and he swallowed nervously.

I could feel his energy in the air had greatly calmed since hunting, but there was a nervousness and life to his energy that was like a volcano just waiting to erupt.

He was volatile.

But for the first time, it wasn't an undercurrent of anger.

It was just boyish nervousness.

"The runaway returns." Kate snickered, looking up from a book at her place on the couch.

He removedly smiled, but uncharacteristically, it didn't touch his eyes.

"Where's the princess?" Kate asked, obviously trying to dispel the tension that was evident between us. "She didn't meet the same fate as your shirt I'd hope."

Emmett rolled his eyes, his joking manner shining through the awkwardness.

"Not quite. Rosalie's outside." He seemed to want to say her name.

"She took you hunting didn't she?" Kate raised an eyebrow as if she was shocked Rosalie had gone behind my back.

I tried not to have any sort of expression on my face that could be misread as both their eyes examined my face.

"I didn't really make it easy on her." Emmett shrugged seeming defensive.

"Oh, I'm sure you didn't." Kate laughed.

She returned to her book, Virginia Woolf, and Emmett knew this was just a momentary reprieve from the journey that'd lead to our looming conversation.

I longed to ease his worry, but nothing seemed to help.

His nerves were vibrating and they'd reached their peak the moment I closed the door behind us.

He kept his eyes down and away and in this moment, he looked like a young boy…

"You can sit." I gestured toward the chair across from the desk I'd used as a study while I was here in Denali.

"I'd rather stand." He mumbled, keeping his eyes down.

"Whatever you prefer." I said, but lowered to sit in an effort to make him feel more comfortable.

The air was thick. The silence was heavy.

"Look at me, Emmett." I exhaled.

He pulled his eyes to mine in a way that was pained, then immediately dropped them back down to the floor.

"I know you've hunted." I began. "I'm not angry with you. I'm glad you and Rosalie are all right."

"I'm sorry, sir - I mean…" He mumbled.

I couldn't even pretend I wasn't taken aback at how he'd called me sir in a subconscious response.

"No, I… Emmett, listen…" I tried to read him, but nervousness fell off of him in waves and he kept tension in his shoulders that created a wall in front of his usually open mind.

Then I realized, it looked like he was braced for me to swing at him.

But, Emmett didn't even realize that was his instinct…

"I wanted to tell you… _I'm sorry_." I said, the sincerity dripping from my voice.

I was sorry for everything.

For all of it.

His sunset colored eyes met mine then in an odd disbelief.

"You were right." I told him with a nod. "I shouldn't have questioned you. It was not my place, and your personal investment in the situation with those people in Tennessee was something I shouldn't have pretended to understand."

Emmett exhaled then, softening as if he accepted my apology. He did so though with a sort of reticence that suggested distrust.

Maybe no one had ever apologized to him before.

"But, this family… this life… the way in which we have to live discreetly to survive unbothered by the Volturi and the human governmental structures in place, I want to prove to you that you can trust in _my_ understanding of it." I spoke, trying to articulate exactly what I meant in a way that would resonate with authenticity.

He clenched his jaw, looking away again.

"What will that take?" I asked him, stepping forward.

He towered over me, but again in this moment, he shrunk.

In this moment, he was young, and naive and I felt every bit of my six hundred years between us.

Even though my body was frozen at just a little over three years older than him, I was over half of a millennia older than him.

He was just a _child_.

"I… I don't know." Emmett began nervously, running a hand through his hair like a nervous kid.

"Do you _like_ this life, Emmett?" I asked him tangentially, but there was a point in understanding this.

At this he looked up, fire in his eyes and he nodded.

"I do." He confirmed.

"And, do you know why I gave it to you?" I asked him. "Really."

"For Rosalie." He answered, speaking her name with new reverence, his voice encasing it with gold.

I shook my head.

"Yes, Rosalie found you, and she brought you to us. I trust Rosalie and I trust her conviction. But really, I saw in her that she believed you could make this life _your own_, that you would carry immortality with intention, and that you would make good of the years you are given. Rosalie believed that your life wasn't finished that day with the bear." I went on. "I believe that too."

He looked at me with an emotion that could only be described as awe.

"I understand the ill-fitting nature of your new instincts, your new senses, and your new life, but I didn't give this existence to you for some sort of servitude of my own personal interests,_ nor for Rosalie's_. This is _your_ life now, Emmett, and it's up to you how you want to live it."

He took a deep, shaky breath then, his eyes running over my face as if he was searching for something.

"I hoped to guide you with my own understanding and help to serve your best interests while your decision making and emotional capabilities are impaired in your newborn state, but I _never_ want you to think I'm trying to control you." I told him, fighting for his eyes even as he tried desperately to look away. "And, I never want you to feel reduced to a peace offering for Rosalie. Because that's not the truth. You're here because _your_ life wasn't finished. It's just beginning, and it's _yours_ to live at your own discretion."

"I…" Emmett looked at me in some sort of panicked confusion like he couldn't believe or process anything I was saying.

"I'm still learning, Emmett. I'm asking you to forgive me that I don't always make the right decision as a leader." I told him sincerely. "I was hard on you and I'm sorry."

"I want to be _worthy_ to lead this family, and I want you to want to be a part of this family. Please forgive me and give me another chance." I pushed, my heart on my sleeve.

Emmett was vibrating with nervousness, but he nodded.

I exhaled, the silence thickening.

"My old man was pretty shitty." Emmett finally mumbled his eyes staying away from me in what looked like some sort of misplaced shame.

"Needless to say, it's not worth the breath to tell the story; in the end it really doesn't matter what he did or didn't do. I just know I try to pretend it didn't all royally screw me up… but, sometimes… I hate seeing that it might've."

I waited, observing the change in his expression as his eyes scanned over .

"I was… _harsh_ in what I said to you." He admitted. "I didn't mean it… all of it anyway."

Emmett was self-assured enough to know pride didn't get anyone anywhere. He admitted he knew he was wrong.

"It's okay." I tried to assuage the guilt I saw in his eyes.

"I just… I still don't know how to _be… around you_." He said candidly, almost flinching as he admitted this to me in his characteristic blunt honesty.

I was shocked at his abrupt change of subject, but I kept up.

"We're still getting to know one another." I offered with a little smile.

"No. It's not that. It's…" Emmett took a deep breath.

"It's…" He frowned. "It's stupid, but… You know… When Rosalie brought me to you, I thought you were God."

He smiled, a little amusement flashing across his face.

"I remember." I chuckled a little snort through my nose but was careful not to offend him.

"I didn't understand a whole lot about God when I was growing up. I mean, I was Catholic when it counted - well, I guess I was actually a pretty bad Catholic, because I didn't… I didn't understand the point of it all. Father, Son, Holy Spirit… The only experience of a father I'd ever had was just… _hell_…"

"So why?… Why would I _want_ anyone like that?… A _Father_?…" His voice shook slightly, just enough to let me know he didn't say this lightly. "I knew what that word meant to me and it wasn't something… _good_."

"Our Father who art in heaven…" Emmett mumbled, looking down the rows of books behind me.

He knew the words. They were braided through his memory, even though it was apparent it'd been a long time since he'd said them.

I waited, seeing and feeling the connection and weight within all Emmett said.

"But, I didn't want any of that. I didn't need it." Emmett confirmed.

"An earthly father _or_ a heavenly one." He said.

I waited, watching him carefully and knowing there was more brewing in his mind.

He took a deep breath, his mind already made up to be open.

"But… But my Mama talked a lot about grace. About… about God lovin' you no matter what you do or who you are, _forgiving_ you…"

His spirituality wasn't something I had expected to address in this conversation, but I welcomed his openness and sensed his tangled thoughts on the matter that I longed to assuage.

I knew I could.

"Yes." I said, just to verbally confirm his expressive processing.

"That part… That sounded nice." He said under his breath, fidgeting nervously.

"It does." I gave him a small smile.

"I went to Confession." Emmett said. "But, I… I could never… understand why God would want to forgive me…"

Edward had been very upfront about believing in the damnation of our souls after this life, and perhaps this was something Emmett was struggling with as well. It burdened my heart and I felt a hopeless fault for what I'd done to them.

The burden was almost too much to bear sometimes and so I looked away from Emmett.

Even if he did find his religion again, would it even matter?

It was obvious though that he was waiting for an answer then, knowing I was well versed in world religions.

"Because…. He loves you." I responded simply because that was the best way to respond to that question.

Emmett frowned evidently not used to that arrangement of words.

Maybe he was having a hard time believing he could be loved.

I saw unworthiness weigh on his expression.

"But, I messed up over and over and over…"

I watched his eyes soften and I tried to remain open and ready to respond as he needed me to.

"That doesn't make you unlovable." I emphasized.

"Even when I screw up, you let me stick around." Emmett expanded, and it was evident then the connection he was trying to make and it made me lightheaded.

It was too much.

He kept his eyes down, uncomfortable speaking to me in this way.

Heart wrenching conversation was far from normalized in any structure between men, but he was expressive and open in a way no one else I'd ever met had been.

"Nothing could drive you out of this family if you really want to stay." I nodded, but treaded with care knowing full well after his barbaric display of strength and anger in Tennessee what he was truly capable of.

With strength like that, he could destroy a city within minutes if he wanted.

But maybe now he was telling me he wanted something more…

"I don't know…" Emmett didn't believe me, seeming to take a similar path in his mind. "I've done some pretty terrible things."

"That was before." I tried to make him see, but he remained discouraged.

"You look at me the same now, even after you know what I've done." Emmett went on. "Even after I deliberately disobeyed you."

"Because you're still you. You're not what you've done." Again, I nodded.

"And what if I screw up again?"

"If you want to be forgiven, you will be forgiven." I said evenly.

"I just don't know how to… I don't know…"

He sighed boyishly.

"I don't know how to not to disappoint people." Emmett finally said what he'd been trying to say for weeks. "I think sometimes I even do it on purpose…"

I nodded, understanding immediately.

"When I was human, I was a pretty big disappointment to my family." I began and he looked up, shocked at the beginning of my story. "My mother died giving birth to me, and so my father devoted his life to the faith. It was a different time. One of chaos in religion and politics, and my father and other clergymen in town led hunts for witches, werewolves, and vampires on behalf of the Anglican church."

Emmett's interest peaked.

"Everyone in town respected my father, feared him even. He was good at pointing out evil and sin. He was even better at punishing it." I went on.

"He had groomed me to take over for him in the raids as he aged, but I… I quickly became a disappointment. No one was on trial. No one was burning at the stake. No one was accused. And my unease in accusing innocents or just distrusting Catholics like you is what made me a disappointment."

Emmett understood.

"But, I _did_ actually find a real coven of vampires in the sewers." I felt heaviness then. "And, that's how I was changed."

"Everyone had been disappointed in me, but I wasn't disappointed in myself, the man that I was committed to being." I nodded. "That's all that mattered."

Emmett nodded.

"When I woke up from the change though… _that's_ when I was disgusted by myself, by what I had become… I thought becoming a vampire meant I would lose myself, but by hunting animals, I realized I could still be the kind of man I could be proud of being."

Emmett's eyes held an emotion I didn't understand and he looked away.

"Emmett, listen. The only thing that would disappoint me is if you used this life as a vampire as a way to lose yourself, and to lose everything you are." I put my hand on his shoulder and this time he didn't flinch away.

He just nodded.

"But, I've _never_…. been any good." Emmett spoke under his breath.

"You know that's not true." I encouraged him, putting my hand on his face in an extremely paternal gesture.

He shrugged me off. It had been too much.

"Well… good _enough_." He corrected himself.

"Do you really believe that?" I asked genuinely wondering if the abuse that scarred him the most was actually psychological.

"I mean… Try keeping up with you or Esme or… _Edward_… for Christ's sake he does everything right." He growled with a deep, labored sigh, running his hands through his hair. "Or… Rosalie…"

"You don't have to _keep up_ with anyone else, Emmett. I want to make it clear no one's asking that of you." I told him. "We're all just asking for _you_."

His eyes searched my face for the truth, and I knew he'd find it there. I knew that he did once his eyes dropped again and the air around him lightened.

"And I think I can speak for Rosalie's interest in the matter as well." I said, trying.

His face turned a paler shade of pale then as his eyes darted to the floor.

"I don't know…" He mumbled.

I figured him out then. He was_ conditionally_ forthcoming. In fact, I think he was blunt and honest and open just enough to distract you from the fact he could actually be withholding something.

Interesting.

I thought then that maybe she'd rejected him. This would explain his insecurity and her guilt.

"Trust me." I prompted.

"I'm _trying_ to trust you, but I don't, and I know it's cause of my old man." He said plainly, his eyes staring into mine now. "Rosalie told me you know that too. You've been studying… people that had… experiences like… that… getting knocked around as a kid, I mean."

I didn't know what to say then. He'd actually caught me off guard. There was a difference in the look in his eyes though as he said this. He wasn't combative or challenging. He was just openly and honestly communicating his disliking of me and where it was coming from.

I wasn't used to such bluntness. It was refreshing, but in this case, alarming.

"Yes, I have." I nodded, validating him. "I wanted to understand…"

Emmett appeared well-adjusted, but I worried…

"But, I don't…" Emmett furrowed his brow.

"What don't you understand?"

"I didn't think it affected me. I mean, in the moment, I didn't… _mind it_ really. I mean I never thought he was… _abusing_ me. That's just what… some people do when they're upset."

"Do you really believe that?" I asked him, willing my voice to stay even so he wouldn't be offended.

He needed more intervention than I'd realized.

I'd read about denial and this proved how Emmett still viewed everything his father did to him as justifiable punishment.

This was of course problematic as he navigated his relationship with Rosalie… Particularly as both of them had stories with a different undercurrent of violence.

I had to be careful now.

I was on edge.

He'd revealed something altering.

"I mean that's how his father treated him." Emmett said. "At first, I blamed it on the war, everything my father went through. But maybe it wasn't the war. Maybe it was just him…"

It sent a chill down my spine.

He was insightful.

I was taken aback, wracking my brain for something to say.

"And what about you?"

"What do you mean?" Emmett asked.

"Emmett… Well…. You know, what happened with your father…. that was a pattern of behavior that you don't _have_ to continue and…" I began realizing statistics showed that it was likely for people abused as children to grow up and abuse others.

Edward had told me about Emmett's role in that fighting ring…

"I know that." Emmett truly retorted now, utilizing the full sharpness of his voice as he cut me off. "And, I know what you're suggesting."

"I would _never_ hurt Rosalie." Emmett almost snapped, something deeply convicted in his eyes as he saw straight through my desire to beat around the bush. He preferred an upfront approach. "Ever."

I swallowed, seeing the same burning passion in his eyes now that I did before he killed all those people in Tennessee.

"That's not what makes a man."

"_I know_." Emmett frowned, seeming intensely offended as I questioned him.

"Do you?"

I knew Rosalie was capable of handling herself. She was strong and intelligent, but I could never be too careful especially seeing the way she'd looked at him today.

She was vulnerable.

"I do." Emmett swore intently, staring into my eyes unwaveringly.

"Emmett, listen…" I darted my eyes down, letting him win as he'd desired. "I need you to understand that you didn't do anything to deserve that sort of treatment from your father."

He snorted.

"Nah, I mean I was a pretty bad kid." His eyes didn't show his humor and dismissiveness, but he laughed.

I took a deep breath, trying to sort my words with compassion.

"So you don't think your father was wrong in the way he treated you?" I asked as tenderly as I could.

Emmett clenched his jaw, obviously perplexed with me.

"What good's it do now?" He mumbled. "That son of a bitch's rotting at the end of a rope."

"Frankly Emmett it'd do a lot of good to acknowledge that he was wrong to abuse you." I cleared my throat. "Because I need to be very clear. The studies I have been reading, the one's Rosalie's been reading - they show that the one clear difference in the abused children that grow up to abuse others and those that do not lies in the insight that their parents were _wrong_ to abuse them."

Emmett's eyes came up to me now, alarmed because he knew I wasn't finished.

"And until you can authentically prove that you acknowledge abuse isn't a justifiable punishment for wrongdoings…." I took a deep breath watching the betrayal flood into his eyes. "Until you do that, I cannot allow you to be alone with Rosalie."

"_What?_" He was breathless then, absolutely taken aback like I'd tricked him.

"I can't take that chance, Emmett." I told him gravely. "None of us can. Not with Rosalie."

"I would _never_ hit her. Ever." He emphasized, his eyes wide.

"What if she does something that upsets you?" I asked, trying to keep my tone gentle to calm him down but it wasn't working.

He was a live wire.

"She wouldn't _ever_ deserve something like that. I've never hit a lady. Never and will never. I know that, Carlisle. I do. I get it." He spoke quickly as if to shut the door on my thought pattern leading this conversation.

"Then why do you feel that _you_ deserved something like that?" I asked him point blank.

"It's just different…" He growled running his hands through his hair.

"Not from my point of view." I nodded.

"Goddammit." He snarled under his breath, obviously stressed by this conversation.

His capacity for being forthcoming had been reached.

"Emmett, you are a good man." I told him honestly, seeing it in his eyes. "I know it wasn't easy for you to become one."

He clenched his jaw, keeping his eyes away from me.

"I know you're good. Just because we have expectations for you, and just because you can be _better_ doesn't mean you weren't good to begin with." I went on. "You never deserved what was done to you. You were _always_ good enough."

"Stop." He requested, finally looking up at me. "I know that. I do. Really."

He let out a deep exhale, seeming to relax and open a new compartment of his mind previously hidden from me.

"It was just easier to get through it when I believed I was worthless. I couldn't hate my father if I thought I deserved what he did to me." Emmett mumbled. "I couldn't hate my mother for letting it happen. Or God… Or my sisters for just _watching_."

My stomach sank to my feet. I understood immediately.

"I was thirteen or so, and I'd done something important to me, something that made me who I am, the man I wanted to be - and I got the ever living shit knocked out of me for it." Emmett expanded. "I got a beating I didn't deserve, and I realized it. I realized that day I wasn't getting hit because_ I_ was bad. I was getting hit because_ he_ was."

"I know that my father was wrong, Carlisle. I know. I just… He was still my father and he's still dead and I still… I know he killed himself because he believed there was no other way to find peace for himself… Sometimes its hard to accept I didn't deserve to get knocked around, but at the end of the day… I get it. It's just easier for everyone else if pretend I don't."

I understood that at a deep, soul crushing level regardless of the way his words twisted together ineloquently.

I thought of my father then, all of those raids he led, and all of the ways I thought he was wrong to accuse innocents. However, he was still my father. I remembered that complexity clearly, and I watched it twisting in the depths of Emmett's eyes.

I'd misread him and again, _I was wrong_.

I was speechless then, just nodding. He surprised me again and again, taking me aback with his boldness and unmatched clarity when looking deeply into a situation. Emmett was incredibly intuitive and saw things for what they were with a sort of plainness that seemed processed in his mind easily and honestly.

Nothing seemed too complex or too heavy for him. Just as Edward read minds, Emmett seemed to see things unfolding around him just as clearly.

He knew who he was and how he fit into the world around him.

I knew it was because he was self-aware in a way no one I'd ever met had been. His disjointedness after transformation was dissolving, and he was coming back into his own skin, so it was allowing him to process with a rationality that was undeniably _clear_. He was authentic internally with himself and his own thoughts just as much as he was externally, and this made me aware of his rarity.

In most people there seemed to be a sort of screen or veil between their inner world and their outer world. Emmett didn't seem to possess that filter. He was as clear to me as crystal water in that moment because he allowed himself to share that inner clarity.

"Am I free to go now?" Emmett asked in a sigh, as a child being punished.

I just nodded, absolutely speechless.

He stood then at his full towering, intimidating height and turned on his heel.

"Wait…" I said as he reached for the door knob. "About Rosalie?"

Emmett turned, pausing on the moment.

"Do you trust her?" I asked.

He seemed confused at the arrangement of my words at first, assuming I'd ask if she trusted him. But after all I'd learned about him today, I felt this was a worthy inquiry.

I worried he'd allowed his experience to be isolating or to leave him with heavy armor and deep distrust. He was a kid that had grown up too fast so he held onto childish humor, competitiveness, and games. His forthcoming nature was not naivety; it was protective in that it was a defense mechanism designed to distract people from wanting to see all that he truly had to lose because he didn't want it to be taken. His strength was a compensation for his perception of weakness, hating it in others, but hating it in himself even more. He was afraid... I sensed it in him, deep within him. I'd seen enough in this world to recognize that look in his eyes. He was afraid Rosalie would notice he wasn't invincible. That's how he viewed her. Invincible. And honestly, I wondered if that was what attracted him to her in the first place - not her beauty, but her walls. Her fortresses, her armor. He saw himself in it... He saw the locked doors of her heart and he imagined if she was strong enough to let him in...

Maybe he could be strong enough to let her in too.

But even perceiving all of this, I saw that he nodded.

"I do." The corner of his mouth turned up, revealing a deep dimple in his cheek.


	19. Big God (Part II)

_"And, oddly enough, he needs me, too. That part worked out better than I could have hoped." - Rosalie, Eclipse, p. 165 (Stephenie Meyer)_

Quick note: Thanks for your reviews and encouragement! I truly don't feel like I deserve your meaningful compliments, but it makes my day to see how you respond. This conversation between Esme and Rosalie seemed incredibly appropriate given their pasts and their relationship of mutual respect in the canon series. It has been brewing in my mind, but I feel it was an incredibly difficult chapter to write in the sense of how heavy the subject matter is. I think there's definitely some development of Rosalie's character that is kind of happening in an explosion right now! I do appreciate your patience as I get back into a routine with school and mental health care. I really value your kindness and your reviews! Thank you for investing in me and this story!

Side note: PLEASE BE STAYING HEALTHY AND TAKING CARE OF YOURSELVES! A chapter with Dorothy is in the works of course... Lots coming up soon!

Please consider leaving a review! Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

TW/CW: Sexual assault, PTSD

* * *

**_Big God_**

_Well, you can never know_  
_The places that I go_  
_I still like you the most_  
_You'll always be my favorite ghost_

_You need a big god_  
_Big enough to hold your love_  
_You need a big god_  
_Big enough to fill you up_

_Sometimes I think it's gettin' better_  
_And then it gets much worse_  
_Is it just part of the process?_  
_Well, Jesus Christ, it hurts_  
_Though I know I should know better_  
_Well, I can make this work_  
_Is it just part of the process?_  
_Well, Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ, it hurts_

* * *

**Esme**

Rosalie was in pieces.

I'd never seen her like this.

She took shallow, swift breaths as she watched Emmett walk away with Carlisle, like having him away from her was going to rip her heart straight out of her chest.

She had a starvation for him like I'd never seen her starve for human blood. I was alarmed by the primal need in her eyes so much that I almost told Carlisle to leave Emmett here with her.

She was crumbling and he seemed to take her very skeleton with him so she was left with nothing to stand on.

I knew Rosalie was theatrical, but she was not overtly vulnerable, and now… It wasn't theatrics. It was vulnerability, so it most definitely shook me to my core.

"It's okay." I said to her, wondering if Rosalie was thinking Carlisle was angry with them.

Irrationally, I wondered if Rosalie was feeling protective of Emmett in regards to Carlisle and disciplinary action.

Carlisle was far from a violent or angry type.

"Esme…" Rosalie began in a tiny, ghostly voice, her eyes wide.

"Carlisle's not angry at you." I assured her.

Her bottom lip trembled.

"I know." She swallowed nervously. "I know."

"He's not angry with Emmett either." I said, and at just the mention of his name she seemed to get heavier.

I sensed him on her. His scent lingered on her skin and braided through her hair…

He'd been physically close to her.

Her dress was still wet and ripped up to her thigh; her jacket sleeve was torn at her shoulder. It was one of her favorite day dresses and the fabric stuck to the curves of her body in its wetness. I worried.

I imagined his hands on her and it made my stomach turn in a way I couldn't put my finger on.

"I…" She trembled.

"Are you all right?" I asked her privately, my worry raging within me like a fire.

She just nodded so it wasn't that much of a comfort. I didn't know if I believed her.

"Did he hurt you?" I asked seriously, tentatively stepping forward and into her line of vision so she couldn't avoid my eyes.

Her eyes panicked then and she frowned. The tips of her fingers traced absently across her lips.

He'd touched her there. I knew that look in her eyes. She was recalling.

Her skin held memories.

I tried to make out the patterns of his fingerprints on her.

"No. He didn't hurt me." She breathed, something tragically awestruck about her tone.

I put my hand on her shoulder lightly, but for the first time, she didn't flinch away.

She looked up into my eyes with intention, and I saw that for the first time since the moment she woke up from her change, she looked like a little girl.

A scared little girl.

"What happened?" I asked, my eyes darting to her dress.

"We went swimming." She said evenly, as if this explained everything but it didn't.

It was still a mystery.

"Rosalie, talk to me. I can help you." Concern painted my tone though I tried to keep my voice calm and even.

I exhaled, wishing to shield her from any darkness that surrounded her, but I knew that was impossible.

She lived in darkness. She was reborn from it. She'd become accustomed to it.

Her eyes softened then, and I noticed there was a _light_ in them. After all the darkness they'd seen, all they'd suffered through, there was a light in them that was new as spring.

Then, with a dreamy but heavily significant tone she told me.

"I kissed him, Esme."

My stomach twisted in knots and my emotions went through an entire spectrum in a moment.

But then I noticed she'd said that _she_ kissed _him_. Somehow this distinction seemed significant in that he'd let her take the lead in their physical relationship.

I gave her a little smile.

Emmett was surprising in so many ways, but especially when it came to Rosalie.

This was obviously a pleasant surprise, considering the expectations placed on men and women in romantic relationships. But, beyond that, the nature of being a newborn vampire unable to process emotions effectively.

I didn't know what to say.

"That's lovely, dear." I decided on.

She just nodded, but frowned slightly something evidently running through her mind.

"Did you _want _that?" I asked her tenderly, trying to let her know she could be honest with me.

She crossed her arms then, taking her focus down as this struck a nerve.

I knew that consent was a very touchy topic to her, and I couldn't imagine how complex it had become in her mind. Her wants had not only been secondary, they'd been unimportant, and most tragically, they'd been violated. I wondered then if she even knew what she wanted. Did she know that what she wanted mattered?

Did she even know _how_ to want?

Rosalie clenched her jaw tightly, and I saw that she was trying to turn her words over in her head before she said them to me. Nonetheless, they seemed to fester within her awfully and she hated the taste of them.

"I… Well… I wanted…" Her voice was tiny and unsure.

I worried about her.

In this moment, I read on her face that maybe she _didn't_ want it…

Or maybe she did until she didn't…

Did she not trust him?

Was there something that reminded her, that took her back?

Was it too fast?…

Was she just trying to please him?

Did he push her into something she wasn't ready for?

Was she triggered by a touch?

My entire body tensed up.

"I know I shouldn't but I…." Rosalie clutched her shoulders as she crossed her arms over her chest in her pursuit of invisibility.

"Shouldn't what?" I frowned. "Help me understand."

"I mean I know shouldn't… you know…. want… _that_." Rosalie's eyes flooded with guilt. "Want…_him_. But I… did and… I _do_… _want him. I wanted to kiss him… I… want to… kiss him again…_"

I exhaled, unburdened now that I knew of her willingness and consent, but Rosalie seemed disgusted with herself and her desire. She seemed to be crawling out of her own skin, disjointed and disassociated.

"That's perfectly all right." I nodded, trying to convince her.

"No it isn't." She grimaced, looking away from me.

"Why?" I asked, thinking though that this would open her up.

"Rosalie, you care about him don't you?" I asked this time with the intent of an answer and she knew it.

Her eyes shot up to me and she dropped her arms.

I watched her swallow the words as she looked back to the house.

"Yes. I do care about him a great deal."" She said through her teeth as if she were confessing a sin to a priest.

But, it was the most beautiful thing she'd ever said and I didn't even truly have to pull it out of her.

I saw the change in her, the way life had returned to her face as she admitted this to me.

I exhaled, a smile easily found in my face then.

She seemed to despise the vulnerability that her words revealed and even in her new life, she frowned, turning away from me.

"Then Rosalie, it's all right to… _want_… to be close to him. That's normal and…."

I treaded lightly.

"No it isn't." Her voice rose in pitch, cutting me off like a knife. "Not for me."

A tinge of panic rose in her tone and flashed across her expression.

She meant a woman like her that had been beaten and broken. A woman like her that had been raped and abused. A woman like her that had been invaded brutally on the very deepest of levels. A woman like her that had darkness thrust upon her. A woman like her that had been violated and betrayed. A woman like her that had her innocence ripped away from her.

A woman like her that was still just trying to remember how to put one foot in front of the other and make it through the day…

My heart broke as I bore witness to the pain of her journey.

A journey very different, but still similar to my own.

She seemed to be begging for me to keep pushing and talk about what was plaguing her though it was painful.

"It can be." I whispered.

Rosalie shook her head as if to deny me.

"Rosalie, you can heal." I told her.

"I don't want to talk about this." She said quietly, but I wasn't convinced.

"It was difficult for me to trust Carlisle in the beginning - to trust him not to treat me like my first husband had." I told her candidly, speaking with her about this as I hadn't spoken to anyone but Carlisle.

"It's not the same." Rosalie frowned seeming to hate me comparing our journeys, but that's not what I was trying to do at all.

"I'm not _comparing_… what happened to me with…"

Rosalie iced me out, turning away from me then.

"I'm just trying to relate to you." I said quietly.

"_No one_ can relate to me." Rosalie growled under her breath.

"Then, I'm just trying to keep you from isolating yourself any further." I said matter of factly.

Rosalie didn't retreat, but she didn't surrender as she looked over at me then, taking a deep breath.

"I'm just trying to say that what happened to you in Rochester, Rosalie…" I began, hating the way these words brought such pain to her eyes. "That doesn't have to be the only thing that will ever happen to you. But it will be if you don't open yourself up to the possibilities of this life. You _can_ know happiness. I know that's what Carlisle intended when he changed you. For you to have the opportunity for a different end to your story."

She clenched her fists, her jaw tight and her perfect lips pressed into a hard line. She seemed to vibrate with rage.

I tried to remain steadfast.

"Yes, he wanted me to satisfy Edward's loneliness." Rosalie raised an eyebrow in challenge.

I huffed, knowing this was something she was holding onto. I didn't want to discount her.

"You know it was more than that." I said under my breath.

"To satisfy Emmett this time though, right?" She rolled her eyes, but her voice braided around his name beautifully even as she spoke this in disdain.

"No. To satisfy _yourself_." I pushed. "What do you want, Rosalie? What do _you_ want out of these years that stretch ahead? They're going to come and go regardless, and don't you want to find _some_ sort of happiness in them?"

I watched her exterior begin to crack and her icy eyes begin to melt, but I knew she wouldn't answer so I went on.

"You haven't given up hope for yourself, Rosalie. I see it. _That's_ why you had Carlisle change him. There had to be some sort of hope in you that day, Rosalie or you wouldn't have brought him to Carlisle. Hold on to that hope, Rosalie because in all this darkness it's all we have." I tried to plead with her without getting too emotional in my voice, knowing that irked her and seemed like weakness to her. "I… I know what hopelessness looks like. I know the things it can make you do. I don't want that for you."

I tried to remain as level and rational as possible.

"Do you know why I jumped off that cliff, Rosalie?" I asked her, knowing full well that in the story I'd first told her, I'd told her I fell.

Her brow furrowed, her eyes darting over my face but before she could respond, I spoke.

"My baby… _died_… My entire reason for living was ripped away from me." I said, and the words ripping through my throat torturously.

Rosalie took an inhale that shouldered my pain, but I looked at her and I saw a daughter… I wanted to take every pain from her heart. I wanted to carry her every burden. That's why I told her.

"I didn't… I didn't know you…" Rosalie's voice was ghostly and haunted.

"That was all I wanted in the entire world, to be loved and to love in return…" I recalled the little fingers and toes, shaking my head to shake the pain of what I'd never possess.

"I won't ever have another child. I won't ever look down into the eyes of a baby that's half me and half Carlisle. I won't sing a child to sleep in the rocking chair that my father made for me. I won't get those things I so desperately wanted - and _still _want… I'll carry that around with me for eternity, all those gaps in me…"

"Those gaps still exist, but… I got this life as a way to remind me that there is still hope. Selfishly, I imagined I have this life because I deserve to get _some_ of what I imagined for myself, and this is my chance to do it. It isn't all or nothing. Some of it is still possible, and something out there can make me forget about those gaps I have…"

"I wanted to be loved… And now, _now_ I am loved with a sort of love I couldn't have fathomed before. Carlisle gives my every second purpose and reason, and he fills those holes in my heart." I went on, and I shivered at the heaviness of the conversation knowing I couldn't even begin to articulate what Carlisle and I meant to each other.

"So no, Rosalie, you _won't_ have everything you wanted from a human life… But, I still believe you deserve to have all the happinesses this life can give you. I want that for you, Rosalie. Truly. Carlisle and I both do."

She kept my gaze, staying locked in this moment with me as she processed my words.

Something brewed in her eyes that I didn't understand.

"When he was kissing me… I didn't want him to stop." Rosalie admitted, obviously embarrassed, but convicted enough as if she had to tell me. "I… _I liked it_."

I flinched only slightly, just because the discomfort over the details of their intimacy was fresh to me and because that's not what I was expecting her to say.

She noticed though, imagining that what she'd admitted was as awful as she imagined it to be.

"Because… Because it was the first time anybody'd kissed me like that…" Rosalie breathed, her fingers tracing over her lips. "Like…"

"Like they care about you?" I suggested.

She nodded as if she couldn't bear to say the words out loud herself as a bad omen.

I couldn't help but give her a little smile, but she was mortified, keeping her eyes down, making it obvious she had more to say. She was trying to gather the courage to say it. However, what came out of her mouth next I never would have expected.

"And… that… _much_." Rosalie admitted

That's when I looked into her eyes and I saw a flick of what looked like bloodlust.

But… it wasn't bloodlust.

It was just… lust.

I couldn't help but giggle a little in my discomfort and awkwardness, but Rosalie was grave, shame in her expression now.

"I understand." I told her she need not say any more on the subject, but I was sensing the desperation in her so I just cleared my throat to mask my giggle.

I was ultimately unprepared for how openly she was speaking.

"No… You _don't _understand." Rosalie mumbled now. "It was the first time we kissed, but I… I wanted… _everything_."

I clenched my jaw, just nodding. I knew she was referring to sex though she wouldn't dare admit it out loud.

And, she was still a lady.

"Because… it all felt… _so good_…. and…" Rosalie exhaled shakily. "He was so… It was so easy to trust him and…"

Her candid nature was taking me aback, but I tried to be a soft place for her to land.

He enchanted her…

I worried she'd been blinded…

Then, I worried he'd gotten carried away. It was easy to do as a newborn, but doubly as easy as a man…

"I… I just… felt… so _whole_." Rosalie went on. "And…"

Suddenly though, I understood what she was actually saying and it made my stomach hurt.

She'd exploited their intimacy to heal _her_, not to be close to him.

"He made me forget…" Rosalie breathed, something far away in her eyes.

_She'd used him to erase, not to rewrite,_ and now she knew it.

_She'd_ taken advantage of _him_, not the other way around.

I knew then that what that kiss meant to him wasn't what it meant to her and she was struggling with coming to terms with that.

Their physical relationship had meant something different to the two of them, and that was a glaring elephant in the room.

"I _wanted_… to keep going… It was so easy to go too far with him…" Rosalie ran her hands through her hair, obviously stressed and this phrase stuck out in my mind.

She acknowledged it was_ too far_…

"But then, I… I pushed him away because I…" She breathed shakily. "And, I didn't really _want_ to push him away, but I… I did and…"

Pain and fear painted her tone.

"Rosalie…" I exhaled, opening my heart to take on her torturous suffering as she shared it with me.

She ducked her head then, covering her face with both of her hands.

"Rosalie…" I cleared my throat, signaling the discomfort with which I was beginning this conversation. "We live in a very different world now than the one I grew up in, the one Edward grew up in, and of course the one Carlisle knew."

"It's not… improper for a woman to…" I took a deep breath. "_Want_… things."

She was mortified then, outwardly groaning to signal her despair with this conversation.

"Your… _desire_ is not something to be ashamed of." I said, trying not to let my awkwardness shine through my tone.

"Oh my God." Rosalie's shoulders got high and tense.

I hated this conversation just as much as she did, but I yearned to share my wisdom and experience with her because she needed it.

"But, I want to make sure that you're letting it come from the right place." I told her.

She kept her face covered, but I continued.

"I want you to know there _is_ a healthy way to experience intimacy even after all you've been through." I started evenly.

She cringed and I knew she imagined I meant sex.

"Rosalie listen…" I frowned. "Intimacy isn't just… _sex_."

"Esme, for Christ's sake…" She groaned, but her body seemed to tense at just the mention of the word.

"Do you know that?" I asked.

"Don't patronize me." She growled, turning away.

"Rosalie. I'm not trying to patronize you." I tried again and she paused.

"I can't do this." She told me.

"You can." I encouraged. "It's important for you to know what healthy intimacy looks like."

I was overcome with maternal instincts, and an otherworldly protective instinct seemed to give me all the right words to say.

"I don't want to talk about this. Please." Rosalie's pain seemed to fill her eyes then.

"Rosalie, I care about you. I want to be an advocate for you. I'm on your side." I said. "Woman to woman."

She clenched her jaw, her bottom lip trembling.

"I want you to feel safe." I told her honestly.

"Do you feel safe?" I asked, giving her room to answer me.

She took a deep breath, but eventually nodded.

That seemed to open and bloom a new confidence in me as I continued.

"If you love him…" I began, but she flinched. "If you _care _for him…"

I edited myself.

"Then it's healthy and perfectly natural to want to share intimacy or closeness physically, intellectually, spiritually, emotionally, all of it. Intimacy _isn't_ physical affection."

Rosalie remained icily tense, her eyes away from me.

"Physical affection is just one facet to _express_ intimacy. It_ isn't_ intimacy." I went on. "Does that make sense?"

She furrowed her brow.

"And if you're uncomfortable with physical affection as an expression of the intimacy you share with him, you don't have to use _that_ avenue of expression. There are others."

"All right." Rosalie seemed to allow this to resonate.

It gave me confidence to continue as she really seemed to marinate in this wisdom.

"Intimacy can be talking or laughing or sitting in the same room silently reading and knowing that you're just there for one another." I went on. "You don't have to be physically involved to be close to him."

She nodded.

I waited, because it looked like there was something brewing in her mind.

Moments later she did speak.

"But, Esme, that's the thing… I _did_ want to kiss him…" She said, seeming emotionally vulnerable now. "Until… I didn't…"

"Help me understand." I told her, giving her space to open up because now it was evident she knew she needed to.

Rosalie ran her hands through her hair, twisting some strands around and around.

"I… well… It felt right until… I just… I felt… _shame_."

I nodded.

Control.

What Royce did to her… What he let his friends do to her… It was the most disgusting attack on her body, but it was a tragic recurring attack on her sexuality.

"There's nothing you have to be ashamed of, Rosalie… But, you have to know that you're still healing." I told her. "Be patient with yourself."

She frowned, not liking imagining this was a residual scar of her experience, though I could see she'd begun to accept it.

"So, as you're healing I think it might be helpful for you to acknowledge where your desire came from and check if it's from a healthy place." I told her.

"I don't know…" She mumbled.

"Try." I encouraged.

"I just… at first… I wanted _him_…. Because I… I trusted him and… he made me feel… safe." She barely whispered as if she was afraid of being heard. "But then I… I don't know I started wanting more… I wanted to be… _whole _and it felt like… it felt like he could make me._"_

I waited seeing it evidently started in a healthy place before it had been tainted.

"He… asked me if I was sure before we…" She said under her breath, seeming to recall the shift in their physical relationship and I watched her map it in her mind.

"Were you?" I asked, trying not to shiver.

"I thought so." She said darkly. "But then… I started thinking that maybe if… If he _had_ me… Then it'd…. erase that… that Royce… that they'd… I was so stupid…"

Rosalie crossed her arms tightly, hating admitting this so she kept her eyes away from me and her voice low.

"You're not stupid." I assured her, worrying about the details.

"I pushed him away, but I… I didn't want to but I'm glad… I… didn't…" She was glad she didn't have sex with him because I saw now she acknowledged she was coming from an unhealthy space.

"You can change your mind at any point, Rosalie. You have the right." I told her strongly. "Did he respect that?"

"I know… And he did… So much…" Rosalie nodded. "But, that's why it was easy to go too far with him. I… I wanted too much… and he was so… _good_ to me…"

I sympathized in an exhale, imagining all too clearly that she'd crossed lines she wasn't ready to cross and didn't know until she crossed them.

She couldn't go back. Neither could he.

"I thought if I was his I'd stop being theirs…" She breathed.

My dead heart sank in my chest.

"I… I don't have all the right things to say, and I don't have the best advice all the time, but Rosalie… Your body is _your own_. It's not anyone's but yours. _No one else_." I told her with deep conviction. "I think when you finally know that you don't have to… _belong_ to anyone else, that will be extremely liberating for you."

She clenched her jaw, keeping her eyes distant from me.

"You're your own, Rosalie." I told her.

She had a hard time letting this resonate, but I saw it brewing in her eyes.

"Physical connection is not something that happens _to_ you, Rosalie. It's something you experience _with_ someone." I tried to make her see.

"I know that." She said, as if to just get me to stop talking not as if she really believed it.

I took a deep breath noticing her crumble all anew because she couldn't articulate what she meant and I wasn't understanding.

"So help me understand…" I prodded. "Why do you think you pushed him away?"

"I just… I was there… Until I… I was in Rochester and…" Rosalie seemed genuinely upset, emotions making her voice shake. "He was… Emmett was himself until he was… _him_."

"I… hate that… I hate…" She clenched her fingers in her hair, shutting her eyes tightly.

"Oh, Rosalie. I appreciate your honesty. I know it isn't easy for you." I said softly, trying to tread lightly as I winced at that harsh reality.

Rosalie retreated though, hating this conversation and hating that she'd admitted out loud that she'd connected Emmett to something so… horrible.

She didn't know how to disconnect the two and it was tangling in her as we spoke. She wanted what she and Emmett were experiencing to be separate from what Royce and his friends did to her, but it was all muddled together in her mind.

I didn't have any real answers, but… God, it was painful seeing her look to me for some.


	20. Moderation (Part I)

_"And, oddly enough, he needs me, too. That part worked out better than I could have hoped." - Rosalie, Eclipse, p. 165 (Stephenie Meyer)_

Quick note: Thanks for your reviews and encouragement! I really value your kindness and your reviews! Thank you for investing in me and this story! In this uncertain time, I hope this story provides you some sort of escape or comfort. I'm sending all my love to you all. A chapter with Dorothy is in the works, some more things to set up story wise to tie things up here... Lots coming up soon!

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TW/CW: Sexual themes

* * *

**_Moderation_**

_Want me to love you in moderation_  
_Do I look moderate to you?_  
_Sip it slowly and pay attention_  
_I just have to see it through_  
_You got me looking for validation_  
_Passion's new_  
_Want me to love you in moderation_  
_Well, who do you think you're talking to?_

_Then bow your head in the house of God_  
_And little girl, who do you think you are?_

* * *

**Rosalie**

Edward's eyes darted down and away as soon as I'd caught his gaze. I assumed he was wanting to create the illusion of privacy in my head, but I didn't even know what he'd heard up there. It was too much of a tangle for even me to sift through these days.

I knew he didn't have the patience for much of what was going through my mind. He'd begun to ignore most of it.

He'd avoided everyone's eyes for much of the past couple days, but particularly mine and Emmett's. I still had no idea what he'd heard in our minds that day that scared him off from his reading stoop, and I didn't want to know.

I sat with my nose in a book I'd read a thousand times so I didn't truly have to pay attention, my ankles crossed at the edge of the sofa.

Emmett and Kate were sitting on the floor together at the coffee table doing a 2,000 piece puzzle.

Emmett apparently found the puzzle too easy because with vampiric retention and sight, it was simple for him to fit the pieces together.

He decided it'd be better blindfolded, and he seemed to be temporarily amused as he turned a puzzle piece around in one hand and went over the pieces he'd already constructed with his other fingertips, immediately knowing them and memorizing them.

He was enchanted with the sharpness of his mind, and he laughed childishly as Kate tried to scramble the pieces again. He swatted her hand away playfully.

I knew I was staring, but in the comfort of him being blindfolded, I allowed myself a lingering look at him.

However, Kate wasn't blindfolded.

She caught my eyes and gave me a little wink, but I looked away swiftly as if to deny I'd been looking over the pages of my book.

She pushed to stand from the floor.

"Edward, let someone play something from_ this_ century." Kate insisted. "No offense."

Emmett peeked from under his blindfold and immediately his eyes glanced in my direction, dimples on his cheeks.

"Well come on, Rosalie." Edward sighed, his hands coming to a halt in the middle of Mozart's 23rd piano concerto.

"Oh no, that's all right. Finish the concerto." I said in a mumble.

"No. Please. Play something contemporary and vulgar and musically unsound." Edward rolled his eyes but ultimately seemed in good spirits.

Well, as good spirits as sour Edward can be.

His lips pursed into a line, but he didn't entertain my mental jab at him.

"Yeah, something we can dance to!" Tanya did a perfectly graceful twirl and winked at him in teasing.

"Fine." I snapped my book shut, but kept my eyes down and away from Emmett.

It had been a couple days and neither one of us had addressed the elephant in the room, but I saw Esme and Carlisle watching us even though they tried desperately not to make it obvious.

I'd thought about everything Esme had said and I really did want to heal…

I took a deep breath.

My prevailing emotion these past few days was embarrassment though. As much as I wanted to heal, I was vain, and I couldn't bring myself to the tough conversation that I would have with Emmett.

I'd thrown myself at him. I was greedy for the solace I imagined physical closeness should have given me.

Instead, I was scared and vulnerable and full of shame. I'd tempted him. I'd been positively immoral. I'd been too fast.

I didn't know what I was doing. I was reckless. He was terrifying.

I'd led him to believe I wanted… _that_… I'd… necked with him and I barely knew him.

I shook my head, shaking the thoughts.

I _did_ know him…

The thing was though… _He didn't know me_.

"Play some jazz." Esme requested lightly, and giggled as Carlisle swung her into a dancing position.

My stomach ached, halfway regretting how vulnerable I'd been around her.

"Oh I don't know about that." I huffed, remembering how my mother thought jazz was positively obscene.

The hint of rebelliousness that would have flowed through my dead veins considered playing jazz as I sat down at the piano bench, but ultimately my intense self-control and watchfulness right now allowed me to squash it.

"Play your favorite song then." Emmett addressed me directly, his eyes full of anticipation as they lingered on me.

I took off my gloves to draw my fingertips over the ivories and he watched my hands before looking back to my eyes.

I swallowed, his beautiful face knocking the breath clean out of my chest.

My face seemed to have the same effect on him as his dimples showed deeply.

"Well, it's a slow one." I gave him a little smile, knowing that was his way of reaching out to me.

I was still coy and reserved though, so that response and little smile would have to do for now.

"Save it for me later, then." He insisted, trying as he did so often to acknowledge that we'd kissed.

It seemed to change everything for him.

But, the problem was that… He didn't know. He didn't _know_ all that transpired. He didn't know the dark layers that pulled me deep into the trenches.

He didn't know how far I'd fallen…

I was afraid. I knew Esme was right and I just needed to communicate with him, but I didn't know how.

With this, I tickled the keys into something light and swift, happy to have something to keep my hands busy.

I began "Happy Days Are Here Again" and Esme grinned happily, ready to sing every word.

"Shall we?" Tanya reached out, trying her hand with Edward.

These women were bold in a way I'd never imagined being, and I willed my fingers not to falter and my gaze to stay down as I thought of the next possible trajectory.

Irina was on a hunt with Carmen and Eleazar.

I couldn't even bear to think about it.

"Let's dance!" Kate grinned up at him and I melted like butter on the piano bench.

"You wouldn't mind, would you Rosalie?" Emmett asked me in a velvet voice, absolutely mortifying me in front of everyone before he offered Kate his hand.

I cringed inwardly, angry I'd been put on the spot and my emotions tested.

I was reeling, thinking about her even touching his skin.

I was irrationally, intensely jealous.

My jealousy and selfishness and general awfulness spat out of my mouth before I could even stop it.

"Why would I mind?" I challenged icily, not even turning my head or letting my fingers falter.

The oxygen seemed sucked from the room momentarily as we hung on my words.

I felt his eyes on me full of heavy, suffocating weight.

I'd hurt him, or at least his ego.

Of _course_ I cared.

So, I allowed myself the swiftest of looks in his direction.

"You're sure?" He tested me, and goddamn it I almost broke.

I barely even nodded.

Disappointment and irritation only flashed through his eyes for a second before he looked away from me and swung Kate into a dancing position.

She giggled.

I could have burst into a million flaming hot pieces then, hating everything in this wretched world.

It took every bit of focus to keep my fingers from running on the keys of the piano.

My control shattered, and I played jazz to Esme's delight and Edward's disappointment of course. But luckily, their opposing vocal reactions shook me out of my deep, dark, fuming anger.

I centered myself, taking a deep breath as I continued playing.

Emmett didn't dwell on things like I did. He was made happy and carefree within moments.

It was evident though, just how much Emmett loved dancing.

He was positively uncivilized, not knowing any real steps, but just… _dancing_.

He moved freely and animatedly. He heard music brilliantly, every note inspiring another step without judgment or thought in his mind before he physically processed the music in his body.

It wasn't awkward though or comical.

It was visceral.

I couldn't watch him anymore.

I squirmed, pressing my knees together and biting the inside of my cheek in anxiousness.

I couldn't know what I wanted.

Kate tossed her head back and laughed as he spun her around by linking his arm in hers.

She skipped out of her shoes and he pushed up his sleeves. They weren't dancing close, and for this I was thankful.

He swung her around playfully, childishly, and most importantly to me, _platonically_.

Really, he was just jumping and spinning around more than dancing, but it was… beautiful and I couldn't help but smile and forget about my heaviness, irritation, and downtrodden nature.

I'd never seen anything like him.

I marveled.

Emmett swung Kate around, turning her under his arm and around his back.

His dimples were deep as his perfect, brilliant smile stretched across his face.

My fingers danced across the keys as I watched him, knowing my every note motivated his every movement. I wanted to watch him forever.

His zest for life was contagious, and even Esme and Carlisle started to try learning and mimicking some of the movements.

Edward was too refined with all of those Victorian manners and all that finishing school training, but for the first time I saw him actually… _grin._

I'd seen Edward smile before and it was nothing special, but in this moment, he truly grinned.

Tanya cut in on Emmett and Kate then, getting her turn of being spun around and jumping up and down like children.

Everyone was laughing, and as I sat at the piano, I saw everyone was… _happy_.

Emmett was light as summer rain and I was dark and heavy as a winter storm… I was weighted down with tragedy.

I couldn't ever be as carefree as he was in this moment.

I couldn't give him a life unburdened and free…

One song bled into the next and each second seemed to bleed into another as I withdrew into the shadows.

Then, I was jolted back into reality as someone sat down on the piano bench beside me, _awfully_ close to me.

"You have a go at it, princess." Kate insisted, her golden eyes molten and full of life.

Though vampires couldn't have flushed cheeks, there was vibrancy in her face that hadn't been there before.

It angered me so.

"No, I'm fine." I kept my eyes away from her as I sat up a little straighter.

"I can play for a bit." Kate pushed again.

I clenched my jaw.

"Come on, Rosalie!" Emmett said, putting his hand on my shoulder from where he stood behind me.

"No…" I stiffened then to stone, letting my fingers slow.

"You should dance!" He begged.

"Go." Kate reached over me then, guiding my fingers off the keys so she could seamlessly start where I left off.

My fingers tingled then as I let them off the keys.

"I don't feel like dancing." I said, Kate reaching over my lap and Emmett standing over me.

"Come on, please." Emmett insisted, both his hands coming to my shoulders then.

"No, I…" I began, before he linked both his forearms under my arms to lift me off the bench.

"Emmett!" I protested angrily, hating him before my feet hit the ground and Kate slid over to take my place at the piano.

"Dance with me." He was smiling, his eyes sparkling as I turned around to face him.

I furrowed my brow, looking up at him in a rage that was swiftly dissolving.

He felt it.

"I don't know this dance." I told him in a half hearted attempt to object again.

"Well I don't either." He snickered, offering his hand.

I took a deep breath, loving how instantly it seemed like he forgave and forgot what I'd said to try and deny anything had happened between us.

Something _had_ happened.

It was inexplainable, but the world had shifted and now we were each other's centers. We were… bound to each other in a way I didn't understand… Something that must be specific to the vampiric experience.

But, it was coating our skin and radiating from the ends of our hair. You saw it in a rainbow of colors around us now.

So I took his hand.

With a brilliant smile, he clapped his hand over mine, immediately spinning us in a wild circle. It bubbled up my stomach and felt fizzy like champagne in my fingers and toes.

"Now you just have to do a little somethin' like this." He instructed, linking his arm through mine, twisting around and switching directions, light on his feet like a tap dancer in the cinema.

I was too bound to social convention and technique and found it difficult to depart from what I'd learned and just _dance_.

"I can't." I protested half heartedly in a sort of breathy giggle as he lifted me off the floor, swinging me around his back.

He was absolutely unbridled by convention or style, and in his animated liveliness he was magnetic.

"Trust me." He insisted before he jumped and twirled me under his arm, his hand coming to my waist.

I shivered, but then… I smiled up at him.

His eyes checked through mine before he smiled back at me and tightened his hand at my waist.

In an exhale, I let him keep me close as we whirled around. He dipped me over his arm.

We clapped our hands and twirled under each other's arms and Emmett got the others involved in this sort of circular patten, twisting and stomping and clapping without a care.

I watched his face, made even more beautiful in these moments of freedom.

He put his hands in his pockets, shuffling his feet and Esme followed suit with an unbridled laugh.

She kicked off her shoes, and tried to participate, this encouraging the others to do the same.

It was evident as Emmett cheered Carlisle on that this made him feel at home.

I exhaled, wanting to capture the way he looked in this moment forever.

Emmett was alive and beautifully vibrant. He was living in color when all I'd seen was black and white.

It was blinding.

It was reckless. It was free, and I'd never felt anything like it.

I kept my shoes buckled and all the buttons on my dress fastened even as the others seemed to relax.

I couldn't.

I wouldn't.

"What's going on here?!" Irina exclaimed as she came through the doors with the others.

"We're dancing!" Tanya called happily.

"You call this dancing?" Carmen raised an eyebrow, obviously amused.

"They certainly must wherever Emmett's from." Kate added with a laugh.

"Hey, I never claimed to know what I was doing." Emmett defended himself.

Kate shrugged with a snicker.

"Well, we want in." Eleazar insisted.

There was no telling how long we all danced together, and as Kate turned on the radio allowing us all a chance to fill up the room, I couldn't help but smile.

I realized for the first time in a long time I'd allowed myself a moment of happiness so I almost didn't mind when he used his free hand to turn Kate under his arm and include her in our dance.

Emmett's lightness was contagious. His vibrance was felt tangibly. His essence filled the space so much I'd even been intoxicated by it.

Emmett's eyes captivated me, slowing time around us. In what seemed like both a second and a century though, we were the only two in the room.

It happened in a progression so slow I hadn't even realized it, but I'd melted into his arms.

I was oddly comfortable there, even now.

He kept me close, so I couldn't look up and see his face, but I felt him.

Emmett was tall, exceptionally tall, so that even in my own height and heels, his chin was hovering over my head. He kept his focus tilted down though, and the way his lips could have touched my hairline made my stomach flip in my stomach.

I closed my eyes then, pressing my cheek into his chest, my ear pressed to where I'd once heard his heart beat.

I conjured the sound from my memory.

"I had a lot of fun with you today." He said lightly.

I felt him exhale, as if he'd been deep in reflection. He hugged me close, pressing his cheek into my hair familiarly.

Our familiarity didn't feel misplaced in this moment, but I was certainly cognizant of his closeness in a way that was new and fresh.

That's when I gained the confidence to speak.

My center twisted into knots before I spoke, ultra quiet.

"I did mind." I whispered to him and only him, keeping my eyes away in nervousness.

I hung on the silence in between what I'd said and his reaction with anticipation. My eyes floated up anxiously.

Emmett's arm tightened around me.

Neither one of us needed to say anything then, but as he pulled me into a closer dancing position, I felt him smile and tilt his chin down in invitation.

He asked for a kiss.

His skin was like velvet against mine and I closed my eyes, my stomach twisting in knots.

I was a tangled mess of things then not sure what I wanted.

My mouth seemed to ache like an old bruise, wanting to be kissed again.

But, he sensed my reticence.

"I wish you'd let me kiss you again." His lips traced along the corner of my mouth as he spoke, close.

I hung on a breath.

"I haven't thought of anything else for days." Emmett admitted, his voice low and velvet, rumbling in his chest.

He touched his lips to mine then, but waited on me to truly make it a kiss and kiss him back.

"You make me nervous." I admitted to him, trying my hand at being honest but it really just made me feel like I was going to vomit.

I didn't like it.

I shut my eyes tight, deeply pained.

"Why?" He asked in a rumbling chuckle, pulling away a little.

I couldn't answer that question easily and I bit down on my bottom lip, denying him my eyes.

He seemed to understand this though and pressed his forehead to mine.

I closed my eyes, feeling close to him in a way that let me speak more freely.

"I mean… that day… in the water…" I began softly.

My voice was immediately burdened with guilt for being a subject of his temptation.

He kept his forehead pressed to mine, taking a deep inhale.

"You're trembling." He said lowly in his velvety voice.

I swallowed nervously, feeling his breath on mine.

We didn't move.

I was afraid to inhale and be intoxicated.

"I shouldn't have done that." I mumbled.

He pulled away then, his eyes darting over my face.

"What do you mean?" He asked, his eyes wide and round.

"I wasn't trying… to… I…" I stuttered over my words, my stomach dropping to my knees.

"I didn't mean to…" My voice was so small I didn't think he'd even heard it.

"I didn't… set out to… get so… reckless." I almost threw up the words.

Impossibly, I felt nauseous.

"What's _reckless_?" He asked evenly, but there was an edge to his voice.

I clenched my jaw and he looked over my face with an odd expression.

"Rosalie…." He drew out my name in a sigh, taking my hand.

"Tell me what's going on in your head." He said strongly and tenderly so I looked up into his eyes.

I was nervous, the tension in the air so thick you could cut it with a knife.

"I didn't mean to get so involved…" I murmured. "And… physically…"

He furrowed his brow, trying to understand.

"I didn't want you to think… I…." I stumbled over my words.

"I mean I noticed… I mean I _felt_… your… I _know_ that I…." I cleared my throat and fidgeted as I could barely speak the words. "That I… _tempted_ you."

His lips pressed into a line.

"I didn't want you to think…." I swallowed nervously.

"I didn't think _anything_, Rosalie." He assured me, narrowing his eyes in confusion.

He let me go then, and I crossed my arms over my chest.

"Well, I guess that's actually a lie. I _did_ think… I just thought… I thought I liked kissing you." Emmett answered easily. "I thought you were beautiful, and too good for me… and I thought you looked good in your pink underwear… I thought about the curve of your waist… And that you might even like kissing me too and maybe I imagined that you felt good when I kissed your neck right there…"

He reached out, his fingers brushing by the base of my throat near my collar bone.

I clenched my jaw, but he was right. I did like that.

Focus.

I exhaled, frustrated and shying away from his fingers.

"Talk to me, Rose." He begged.

"I didn't want you to think I… I wanted… to… go any further…." I stuttered. "I really _don't_ want to… Well… I didn't want you to…"

He waited, his eyes changing as he looked over my face, immediately understanding.

"Have you_ kissed_ somebody before, Rosalie?" He raised an eyebrow.

I immediately got defensive.

"Yes. What does that have to do with anything?!" I panicked.

"I mean… you're plenty good at it. That's not what I was sayin'." He held his hands up in surrender.

"I just ask because… well because… I didn't think you wanted to actually have _sex_ with me just because we necked a little." He said candidly with a little unsure laugh that made him sound like an unsure teenager. "That's not how it all works."

I stiffened at just the word, feeling impossibly nauseous.

He spoke about these things so openly, so easily…

I shook my head, hating to even entertain the thought in my vulnerability.

It was improper. Surely he knew that.

"Don't patronize me." I growled, feeling vulnerable so I lashed out in my anger.

"I'm not meaning to. I just… I don't know if you understand…" He seemed to pick his words which was uncharacteristic of him. "People can kiss for plenty of reasons that aren't… _always_ about sex…"

"I _know_ that." I grumbled. "Don't speak so explicitly to me."

"Well, I wanna be clear and honest so, I'm gonna talk straight with you." He said with a nod of finality. "You can handle it and still be a perfectly fine lady."

I frowned.

"Are you real religious?" He asked, and I knew he was trying to place my anxiety about all this.

"Not anymore." I snorted humorlessly.

"Well, I'm just tryin' to figure out why you think you should feel guilty for _anything_ we did together." Emmett shrugged. "Because there's literally no reason on this earth I can clearly see."

"Because… I don't… want… to… do… _that_…"

"We didn't." Emmett frowned, trying to understand me and trying to get me to understand him so he enunciated his words. "Rosalie…"

"Kissing isn't _shameful_, Rosalie." He tried to lighten the blow of the statement with a little humorless snort.

"I know, but it was… _more_ than that. I mean you…" I panicked.

He sighed exasperatedly, putting his hand on the bridge of his nose in a way that suggested he was trying to come up with the right words and they weren't coming so he was just gonna settle on whatever came to mind organically.

"You know that's not…_ why… _that happened. I just got… turned on because you're way outta my league and I like you and I like kissing you. It's not like it happened because I _actually_ thought I was going to have _sex_ with you. That's really not how it works. I mean that's ridiculous…"

I was panicking and his voice sounded like it was coming from underwater and I felt like my brain was thin ice about to crack and rush like raging water all around my head.

"But, it's my fault." I spoke mousily, feeling so much shame eating at my center. "I shouldn't have… been so…"

My mind instantly spiraled to just how bad it could've gotten and I shivered.

I was… _embarrassed_.

"So what?…" Emmett looked at me like I was speaking a language he didn't understand.

"So… _vulgar_…"

"You weren't _vulgar_." He laughed. "What are you talking about?"

"I…." My bottom lip trembled. "I don't want you to think I'm… _that_ kind of girl."

"I don't think you're anything but perfect… _That's_ the kinda girl you are." Emmett said, brushing my hair behind my ear.

"But I…."

"Rosalie… Darling… What are you really upset about?" He reached out, grabbing my face in his hands, caressing me with his tenderness.

"I don't understand you. But I want to. I really want to… So I'm gonna keep trying if you'll just _help_ me.." His eyes darted over my face, genuinely worried.

I couldn't say anything as I looked up at him, hoping for once he could read it all in my eyes because it all felt like it was crashing down on me.

"Rosalie." He said my name strongly, trying to tether me to our conversation and not my inner world.

"I didn't want… But I… I still tempted you… I wasn't thinking clearly and…" I trailed. "I shouldn't have been so… careless… What… could've… happened…"

"Rose, it's not like _I_ don't have any real choice in the matter." He laughed a little in a burdened exhale, his eyes darting over my face.

He looked half as nervous as I felt as he ran his hands through his hair.

"Well… Well, I didn't make your choice very _easy_… I took off… my clothes… I… kissed you and…" Blame ate away at me and rotted my stomach from the inside out.

I was worthless…

Panic rose in my throat, and I started to cry without tears, covering my face as I sobbed now, hating that all of this seemed to burst from within me.

He was silent as he watched me cry, and the more I cried the more I was filled with rage that the monster within me was getting wilder and stronger.

If we possessed the ability to generate tears, I would've found a way to cry them. I caught my breath though, pushing my hair back away from my face as if I could push off the darkness that made me so unworthy of him.

"Whatever you do doesn't make my choice _any less easy_." He fought for my eyes as I calmed down, seeing something in my face that gave him the conviction to say so.

_"_I would _never_ choose to make you do anything you don't wanna do or anything you're not _ready_ to do. That's the easiest choice in the world. Every time."

I bit my bottom lip, feeling myself shaking with fear and an odd, defensive and bubbling rage.

It was a beautiful arrangement of words. I didn't know if I believed him, but oh how I wanted to.

But for now, I just exhaled shakily, weighing these heavy words in my soul.

"Do you regret kissing me?" He asked plainly.

I clenched my jaw.

"I… I don't know." I swallowed nervously.

This seemed to wound him, but he put it aside for me.

"Was that too much too fast for you?"

He didn't ask to test me. He asked to _ask_ me.

I clenched my jaw, unsure of my response so I just shrugged.

"I don't know." I mumbled under my breath, knowing my mother would've scolded me for being unclear.

"That's okay too." He sacrificed his own ego for me, smiling openly as he brushed a hair behind my ear and kissed me on the forehead. "We can slow down and see how you feel."

I took a deep breath, closing my eyes at the feeling of his lips on my forehead.

It was… safe.

No one but him had ever done that.

"I need you to know I kissed you like that because I think you _should_ be kissed like that, and I know _how _to kiss you like that - like you're the only girl on earth because… because you _are_… to me." He nodded assuredly. "I kissed you like that because… Because I wanted you to think that maybe you could love me some time, and maybe… I could love you too."

He spoke candidly, but nervously, a boyish look in his eyes.

My fingers traced over my lips absently as I thought about what he said, the significance of it.

Could we?

But…

How could I get back the safety that I had lost?

How could I move on with Emmett?

How could I feel safe?

How could what was brewing between us ever be healthy?

"I didn't kiss you like that because I wanted to have sex with you. And _I'm_ sorry if that's what _I_ made you think." He spoke tenderly and kindly, looking deep into my eyes. "That's on _me_. Not _you_."

"You don't…_want_ that?" I exhaled unable to believe what he was saying.

"No… Well, yes… But, not… _rationally_… at _that_ very moment…" Emmett answered. "I mean I… do… I mean… I don't know what I'm trying to say…"

He laughed nervously, and it lightened my demeanor slightly.

"I'm just so over the moon that I got to kiss you because… I like you and I think you're the most beautiful person I ever laid eyes on. That was the best kiss I ever had with the best gal I've ever known. I am _insanely_ attracted to you, and you made my knees weak in those pink bloomers - if I'm allowed to comment on your underwear…"

"You aren't." I lightened a little at his humor and all those swoon-worthy comments. "You weren't supposed to look."

"I just want you to be happy, Rose. Honest." He exhaled, tracing his fingers over my cheek sweetly. "That's _all _I want from you. Do you believe that?"

I didn't say anything in response to his question, but it didn't bother him. I really couldn't find the words, so I just reached for his hand.

My mind tangled and twisted just as our fingers intertwined.

I took a deep breath.

I wanted to tell him that I believed that my happiness was all he wanted from me, but it was still too difficult to honestly admit.

He knew that.

As I ducked into his side, letting him put his arm around me, I knew I'd told him that I was going to _try _believing it.

He let the air fill with silence.

The silence wasn't heavy though.

I looked up at him, my eyes tracing over his jaw and settling on his totally scarless cheekbone, where I'd started that kiss.

Self-sacrifice was evident in the air around him, and as I thought about this pattern of his, it made me… _sad_ because I knew I'd ask him to do it for me again and again and again.

"I… don't regret kissing you." I finally said, in a tone like a whisper of wind, but he heard me.

I wanted to be more articulate than I was and I hated the discordant arrangement of words as they tumbled out. However, Emmett looked at me like it was the most beautiful sound he'd ever heard.

Dimples deepened in his cheeks and his fingers tightened in mine.

"Really?" He said, his tone sincere and full.

I swallowed nervously, but something about that made a grin stretch across my face.

I didn't regret kissing him. I didn't regret his hands on me.

"Really." I breathed.

"We'll do it again when it suits you." He said charmingly, his smile lighting up his face.

I bit my bottom lip.

I smiled.

I felt the butterflies of flirtation in my stomach lightening my heaviness.

I looked up at him, thinking he'd read it in my eyes, but he waited just to be sure.

"It suits me now." I breathed, and before I could even finish my sentence, he pressed his lips to mine again and I tossed my arms around his neck.

He braided his fingers in my hair, the hunger of a second kiss seeming to even multiply from our last.

It was impossible to hold back with him, and regardless of how much I'd intended on kissing him with reservation this time, I couldn't do it.

We couldn't kiss each other with hesitation.

It was like wildfire. We were consumed and set ablaze.

There was no moderation.

I melted into him, his hands now pressing into my lower back. I didn't know what came over me while I was kissing him, but whatever it was felt a little different this time - clearer.

My every cell felt him and memorized him.

I liked kissing him and as he smiled against my mouth, I was made undeniably happy.

He pulled away then, pressing his forehead to mine as he took a deep breath to inhale me, right before he drew a line in the sand.

Emmett did it _for_ me, it was evident in his eyes.

He withdrew.

"I… really… like you, Rosalie." He said, kissing my forehead in a sort of tortured finality.

It was evident he didn't want to pull away, but he did.

I didn't want him to but I needed him to, so it was a curious thing to watch the self-sacrifice in his eyes.

"Do you know that?" He asked me, importance in his eyes.

My throat felt tight as I looked up at him, very nervous again because I saw something in his eyes I didn't understand.

"Yes." I answered in a breath.

I realized that as we danced and as we kissed, I hadn't once gone back to the shadows of Rochester...

I'd stayed here... with him...

Victoriousness charged through my veins like an electric jolt and I giddily kissed him, tasting his lips sweet as honey. I wanted more because... I wanted more of him, not because I wanted less of me.

That was a big difference.

"And I quite fancy you." I triumphantly smiled up at him the truest thing I'd ever said.


	21. Moderation (Part II)

_"And, oddly enough, he needs me, too. That part worked out better than I could have hoped." - Rosalie, Eclipse, p. 165 (Stephenie Meyer)_

Quick note: Thanks for your reviews and encouragement! I really value your kindness and your reviews! Thank you for investing in me and this story! In this uncertain time, I hope this story provides you some sort of escape or comfort. I'm sending all my love to you all.

A chapter with Dorothy is in the works, potentially in the next few, just some more things to set up story wise to tie things up here and be good with leaving them for a bit... Lots coming up soon!

Side note: PLEASE BE STAYING HEALTHY AND TAKING CARE OF YOURSELVES!

Please consider leaving a review! Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

TW/CW: A little easy peasy lemon squeezy in here ;) you were warned

* * *

**_Moderation_**

_Want me to love you in moderation_  
_Do I look moderate to you?_  
_Sip it slowly and pay attention_  
_I just have to see it through_  
_You got me looking for validation_  
_Passion's new_  
_Want me to love you in moderation_  
_Well, who do you think you're talking to?_

_Then bow your head in the house of God_  
_And little girl, who do you think you are?_

* * *

**Emmett**

"Parlez… lentement…. s'il vous plaît." I stumbled through the sentence and Rosalie bit her perfect bottom lip, amusement in her eyes.

"Your accent." She giggled.

"God, what's wrong with it this time?" I tossed my hands up in half fake frustration.

"You sound like you're from Tennessee." Rosalie said.

"Well sweetheart, I am." I rolled my eyes, winding my arm around her shoulders and kissing her cheek.

She tried to get me to focus and correct my pronunciations, but it was mostly hopeless and I learned that with just how elastic my mind was, new language was still a challenge. It made it fun to be a challenge though, as so many other things came so easily.

I enjoyed learning languages also because I loved having an excuse to look at her mouth.

I _loved_ watching her speak French….

"Do you know what you said?" She asked, putting my thoughts back on track.

I nodded.

"Talk slower, please." I translated.

"Good." She approved.

"Bien." I attempted knowing it sounded wrong.

She bit her lip again, her eyes sparkling.

"Goddammit. I tried." I laughed.

"You did." She grinned, tucking her hair behind her ear then she spoke her previous phrases slower so that I could understand.

Things had rapidly progressed with Rosalie this week, but still in a way that felt natural and not _too fast_. Being close to her was the most natural thing I'd ever experienced, but it was still a marvel that _she_ remained so close to _me_.

Dancing together and talking so deeply had seemed to help her feel more comfortable opening up to me again, and I thanked my lucky stars for that.

It was troubling that she'd had such a hard time coming to terms with our physical relationship, though of course it wasn't a surprise to me when she expressed her concerns. I wish I'd been sharp enough to intuitively know these reservations she had, but even now I hoped I was strong enough to respect them.

I had to be.

And, of course, to me she was worth it.

I still didn't understand her guilt and her fixation on 'fault' and I couldn't pretend to. But, I could see it in her eyes every so often when she imagined she'd pushed me to a limit I couldn't control myself at.

She'd kissed me too deeply. She'd worn a dress that showed her figure. She'd let her gaze linger.

She operated with a cautiousness around me that I couldn't understand, but

The past few days it was evident progress had been made because she didn't get up and leave any room I entered, in fact, we spent most of the time together, if not side by side.

She finally seemed confident enough to spend time with me and speak with me in front of the others as well, though when I reached for her hand to hold as I sat next to her, she denied it.

Baby steps I suppose.

Carlisle hadn't let us go hunting alone this morning, and so he and Esme accompanied us, but as if it was some sort of test that we'd passed, we'd been left alone for the last few hours.

For this, Rosalie and I both seemed thankful.

I loved seeing parts of her that no one knew. I loved experiencing things with her in our own private world.

She bloomed when we were alone…

She kissed me then, soft and sweet and I smiled against her mouth.

"What are you thinking about?" She asked, her eyes darting over my face.

"You." I assured her.

It pleased her to no end of course, and I was happy.

"I want you to read to me." I requested, seeing her fingers dance around the spine of the book she'd brought along.

French poetry.

She figured it'd help my proficiency along, and I agreed of course, but I was just wanting to watch her speak really.

Rosalie was too well mannered to admit she also wanted to boast her French speaking skills to me by reading aloud. I could see it in those pretty, stubborn eyes of hers now as they filled with beautiful, confident pride.

As we settled in for the afternoon under the clouds with the looming promise of snow, time passed slowly and sweetly. We orbited around one another naturally, beginning to intersect as we touched in a second nature ease.

"Je songe à notre Terre, atome d'un moment,

Dans l'infini criblé d'étoiles éternelles,

Au peu qu'ont déchiffré nos débiles prunelles,

Au Tout qui nous est clos inexorablement." Rosalie's voice was soft as velvet, her tongue curling around her words in a way that seemed to have texture, smooth as silk and rich as chocolate.

I loved hearing her speak French even though I hadn't the slightest idea what she was saying yet. I caught some words, but watched her eyes as they scanned the page, seeing melancholy in them so I knew the poem was sad.

I didn't dare close my eyes because I wouldn't be able to marvel at her angel's face, but I would've heard the sadness in her voice even if I couldn't see it crossing her eyes like shooting stars.

"Et notre sort! toujours la même comédie,

Des vices, des chagrins, le spleen, la maladie,

Puis nous allons fleurir les beaux pissenlits d'or." She continued.

She was reading _Triste, Triste_ from a book she held with her right hand. In the crisp autumn air, we sat together on the cliff's edge with magnificent blue mountains stretching out around us. Mountains made me feel at home, but it was more the way my head laid in Rosalie's lap and the way her free hand mindlessly turned through my hair as she read that calmed me most.

This was the first day since I'd woken up as a vampire that everything inside of me felt… _normal_. Before, I'd felt like I'd been struck by lightning and the electricity was still wildly zapping through my veins. I'd been on edge, tightly wound, ready to explode… I'd been volatile and reactive, readily vibrating with energy, but in this moment…

In this moment, I _exhaled_.

I watched her mouth curve around her 'r's and I realized I'd never felt this at ease.

Ever.

Even human.

I'd always been running, always been turning, always been trying, always been… reaching.

Now, I was still.

She must've felt me exhale because she looked down at me and gave me a smile.

"What is it?" She asked.

"You're beautiful." I told her, starting to kiss her perfect skin, starting at the palm of my hand and crawling up her wrist as I pulled her down to me.

Her mouth turned up and a radiant smile stretched across her face.

"You're supposed to be paying attention." She said with a little teasing bite on her bottom lip that made me want to kiss her.

I waited though, and as she ran her hand through my hair, I took a deep inhale, wanting to breathe this moment in.

"I am." I told her matter-of-factly. "Now please, finish."

"L'Univers nous reprend, rien de nous ne subsiste,

Cependant qu'ici-bas tout continue encor.

Comme nous sommes seuls! Comme la vie est triste!" She exclaimed.

I knew it was the end by the way she pulled her voice, the way she breathed. The way she let the words resonate. The way she weighed the poetry.

"What does it mean?"

"It's… about sadness." She explained, her eyes hovering to the space where the mountains cut into the skies.

"Why are they sad?"

"Well…" Rosalie frowned. "There's not really a circumstantial reason in the poem; it's just about the condition and expression of sorrow. Contemplating sadness, not _being_ sad."

"I'm not sure I understand the difference." I said.

Her brow furrowed and she dove deep into thought.

"Well… I suppose it's about the emotional experience departed from the causation or circumstances to make the poem more universal." She imagined intelligently. "Everyone's been sad… But, everyone's had a different reason to be."

"I_ never_ want you to have a reason to be." I told her, looking up into her perfect golden eyes. "Never again."

She exhaled heavily, and I couldn't pretend I couldn't feel the condition of sadness that weighted her down, the sorrow that painted over her perfect face.

"What is it, Rose?" I asked sitting up next to her, taking her face in my hands.

She pressed her forehead to mine, and I realized this was becoming a habitual act to ease whatever hard thing we needed to say when it was too difficult to look into each other's eyes and say it. I closed my eyes as she closed hers and wound her arms behind my neck.

"I know you care about me…" She started. "And… you _do_ make me happy."

"But…" I pressed knowing it was coming.

"But, I'm still… sad." She breathed, her breath sweet on my lips as she said these heavy, awful words. "And I don't know if I ever won't be."

My stomach felt droopy and heavy as I processed her sadness.

"Why are you sad?" I asked her, seeming like this was the most simple question.

It wasn't - not to her.

"I suppose it's become a habit at this point." She murmured. "Like the poem… The reasons… They're _there_ but… it's insignificant and so far away now it seems silly to be sad over them anymore. Sadness is just… ever-present now. Just a part of who I am."

"Are you sad right now?" I asked though it seemed stupid.

She just nodded, but still held my forehead against hers.

"Let me keep tryin to make you happy though, Rose." I mumbled, taking a deep breath. "Please. You can be. I know you can. I've seen it."

I felt her swallow, winding her arms around my neck now. We faced each other with honesty and openness, and she kept her forehead connected to mine.

"That's what makes me saddest." She breathed, admitting what seemed like the hardest part.

I clenched my jaw, this feeling an awful lot like rejection.

"Because… I… I want to be happy for me, but now, I want to be happy for _you_ too." She said. "You try… so hard, and you're so good to me and, you are so… _light_, but I'm not. I'm dark and heavy and…"

"I don't care." I told her seriously, holding her close.

"But I do." She said softly, but with authoritative finality. "Because… Because I… I care about you, Emmett. I_ do_. So much and…"

Even with how beautiful her words were, I hated the darker message behind them.

"Don't." I cut her off, not wanting her to finish.

She touched her lips to mine, ever so slightly and it made me shiver.

"I know you deserve someone that can be happy with you… and weightless, and light." Rosalie mumbled, but she wasn't finished.

"I don't _want_ someone else…" I started to argue again.

This seemed to resonate with her deeply, seeing I wanted her. It fueled a spark in her.

But she played coy.

I knew what she was doing, and I knew what she wanted.

And, I was up for giving it to her.

She wanted my devotion.

"I just want _you_." I told her.

"But things are always going to be difficult between us…" She breathed, tracing her lips over the corner of my mouth.

"We can handle it." I assured her, wanting to taste her.

She could feel it.

"But, what if we fight?" She asked.

"We'll challenge each other." I worded it prettily, hoping she'd find it amusing.

"And, what if you get tired of me?" She worried, her voice small and unsure.

"I'm crazy about you, Rose. Don't you see that?" I held her face in my hands, keeping her close.

She didn't answer and I touched my lips to hers, speaking against her skin.

"Don't you feel it?"

"I'm so selfish." She grieved, pushing away and now looking straight into my eyes, strength and power flickering through them. "I can't let you have what would be best for you. I won't."

"Because, I want you for myself." Rosalie said in barely a whisper.

In that moment, I would've done anything she asked.

I felt my dead heart wrench in my chest, as my eyes danced over her face.

Rosalie kissed me hungrily and confidently. I let her set the pace, though that wasn't always the easiest thing to do, especially right now.

She pulled her body closer to mine as she wound her arms around my neck. I kept one hand on her gorgeous waist and the other on her cheek, holding her to me. As we kissed, for the very first time she laid next to me.

Rosalie tilted her chin up to initiate another kiss and this time, her ankle draped over mine as if testing the waters.

After this slow progression, she felt more comfortable advancing and she draped over me, her arm around my waist and her leg across mine.

I smiled against her mouth and she melted into me.

Innocence still surrounded her, and I didn't dare try anything fresh with her.

But, God in heaven…. Her body, against mine.

It took everything in me trying to hold myself back as she invited a deeper kiss and her body snaked around the length of mine.

She pressed her lips to mine with newfound fervor, before she trailed her kissed across my jaw and down my neck.

I tried to keep my cool and stay in my head, but recalling calmness was extremely difficult to do as her lips found the hollow of my collarbone.

It was a weakness.

It was the oddest thing that the more I tried to control myself with Rosalie, the more I thought about blood…

God what I wouldn't do for…

I was shocked back into reality with Rosalie as she tangled her legs through mine.

I halfway expected her to start pulling away, but she didn't.

I was careful with her then, but she clutched a handful of my shirt, her fingers hungry as she held me to her. She was straddling my right leg as she lay, and I wound my arm behind her back.

I could feel she wasn't committed to straddling my waist, but she was considering it.

Her lips found mine again in a feverish desire.

There was no sensation on earth like the sensation of kissing her, and my God, it just kept getting better.

She approached kissing me with curiosity now, testing and trying as she found what had been a previous boundary.

Her hand trailed over my stomach, stopping at my hip as her fingers curled around my waistband.

I was clay in her hands then, feeling desire flood through me as she pursued her quest at her pace.

But God in heaven… I needed her to touch me.

As we kissed, tangled up in each other, time stood still and rushed by all at once.

She molded her body around mine, finding space to fill to keep us connected in a way that seemed she was… asking for my hands on her.

I had to be sure though, and as I proceeded, I did so slowly. The hand on her waist, I let trail to her thigh, latching her leg around me. My other hand I had on her face I traced down her neck and over her collarbone.

I kept my fingers light on her, still over the fabric of her dress though I was tempted to start on her buttons.

I wouldn't dare.

She responded to my advances, leaning in to my touch and I was tempted to let my hand settle on her perfect chest. I wanted to feel her, and I squirmed at the thought, but I didn't do it.

Kissing was one thing, but we were horizontal and I knew that meant something to a fancy, mannerly gal like her.

"Emmett?" She breathed my name in a way that made me shiver.

I found her eyes then, and noticed she was _present_. Her eyes weren't flat or empty as they had been in the past when we'd kissed like this. They _saw_ me.

"Touch me." Rosalie exhaled, drawing closer to me as I found her eyes.

They were wide and open, asking with vulnerability and trust that nearly overwhelmed me.

I just nodded before she pressed her lips to mine again, her kiss deliciously sweet all anew.

Those words made me absolutely filled to the brim with desire as I thought of what she asked.

Like a fantasy, she was mine to explore and so I touched her with reverence, but with a new divine hunger.

We poured ourselves out for one another, and I longed desperately for her indulgence.

I kissed her with assurance as I chased my desire to at last have my hands on her chest.

Traveling down her shoulder and over the fabric of her dress, I spread my fingers over her breast.

She sighed into my mouth, pleasure radiating out of the sound so it crucified me how badly I wanted her.

I kissed her deeper and harder and she wound her leg around me, tighter.

I touched her and she melted into me.

I wanted…

I caved to my need and I tried. Taking her hips in my hands, I shifted her over so she had one knee on either side of my waist.

Rosalie was cautious and kept her hips tilted backward and away, but she was on top of me nonetheless and I pressed to my hands so I could sit up under her, closer.

Our lips stayed connected and I kept my hands on her, touching her in a way that made her sing.

She relaxed into me then, feeling me between her legs, but this time not being scared off by my desire.

Instead, she seemed pleased. She took my bottom lip in hers and gave it a swift little bite.

God, she was something else.

We wanted more.

_Shit._

Her body.

We pulled away from each other in unison, both checking in to each others' eyes, and though we didn't need oxygen patterning our breath to one another's as it quickened.

She kept her eyes in mine as she reached down between her legs and under her skirt to my waistband where she would try once again what she'd begun earlier.

My dead heart thudded in my chest and all over again I pulsed with desire; we were silent now but so much filled the air as she changed and her confidence grew.

"Are you sure?" I asked in a low, resonating growl already knowing it'd be the damn near hardest thing I'd ever have to do to pull way from her now.

"Yes." Rosalie's eyes floated down, but I kept mine on her as her thumb flicked the button open and her fingers dove past the waistband of my trousers. She bit her bottom lip as she pulled at the zipper.

I couldn't help myself then, kissing her with need. She lingered her fingers and a rumbling exhale pushed at my throat as I anticipated her touch.

I felt her hand trembling slightly as she approached this boundary with ultra sensitive caution. She kept her hand atop of the fabric of my underwear, this barrier seeming important to her.

My body was vibrating with the energy of need and I desperately wanted…

_Holy. Fuck._

_Rosalie Hale._

I released from her lips, but kept my forehead to hers as I exhaled deeply, my hands hungry on her body as her hand traced down the length of me.

The moment she did that, I knew never again was I my own. I was hers.

And I was hers gladly.

She paused in her uncertainty, but the way I reacted urged her on encouragingly.

I couldn't think clearly, nothing I'd ever experienced before with dull human senses compared to the way it felt having her hands on me, a teasing precursor.

I was greedy and I wanted more.

Rosalie exhaled full of dreamy sensuality as she took stock of what I had in my pants, and boyish insecurity flashed through my mind like an awkward shooting star.

Rosalie was still straddling my lap, her hand between her legs and down my pants. I imagined touching her like she touched me.

I imagined what it'd be like to be inside of her.

My mind was difficult to gain control of, and as she kissed me and I let my hands explore her perfect body, I tried desperately to focus.

But, oddly enough the more I tried to focus on controlling my physical lust for Rosalie and keeping myself in check to protect her, the more blood lust was allowed to take the forefront in my mind.

My throat burned now as she continued, her fingers coming to the waistband of my underwear, and I felt blood lust ripping through my cognizance until I couldn't do it anymore.

I couldn't.

Blood.

Human blood.

My focus turned and immediately I was a predator.

I was a man secondarily…

I shoved her off of me, feeling threatened by her presence in the hunt, ripping through the woods with panicked desperation until I found it.

A small camp, three of them.

In blind thirst, I unleashed.

All the power I'd had to keep in check. All the control I'd had to display. All the withholding I had to do.

I surrendered.


	22. No Light, No Light

Quick note: Thank you endlessly for your reviews and encouragement! It makes me SO HAPPY to see your responses! Thank you for investing in me and this story! In this uncertain time, I hope this story provides you some sort of escape or comfort. I'm sending all my love to you all.

A chapter with Dorothy is next!

Side note: PLEASE BE STAYING HEALTHY AND TAKING CARE OF YOURSELVES!

Please consider leaving a review! Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

TW/CW: Just a little more easy peasy lemon squeezy (teaseyyyy) in here ;) you were warned!

* * *

**_No Light, No Light_**

_You are the hole in my head_  
_You are the space in my bed_  
_You are the silence in between_  
_What I thought and what I said_

_You are the night-time fear_  
_You are the morning when it's clear_  
_When it's over you'll start_  
_You're my head, you're my heart..._

_A revelation in the light of day_  
_You can't choose what stays and what fades away_

_And I'd do anything to make you stay_  
_No light, no light_

_Tell me what you want me to say_

* * *

**Rosalie**

"Emmett, stop it!" I shrieked, following him in a desperate sprint.

I knew it was dangerous, but I had to stop him. I'd never forgive myself.

He whirled around, snarling at me villainously, swiping at me to stay away from him so he pushed me off balance and ripped the sleeve of my dress.

The two men were dead before they could even think to scream. Emmett was efficient if anything, but he savored the girl.

She didn't scream. She couldn't. It was happening too fast.

His eyes lingered on the girl before he drank from her. She was about our age, but had a dainty tiny frame, so she stood no taller than the center of his chest.

Braids and ringlets of unruly, red curly hair made a halo around her innocent face, a few freckles dotting her little but aesthetically pleasing nose. Her round navy blue eyes were exquisite behind a veil of black eyelashes and as she looked up at him in shock, they sparkled in a way only human eyes could sparkle.

A tinge of irrational jealousy infected my heart and made me yearn for my own forever-lost violet eyes. How they would've sparkled as Emmett made me laugh, as we were married in a church, as we were grey-haired and surrounded by grandchildren.

I clenched my jaw, and even though just a second had passed for the human, I had mourned the losses of an entire lifetime before her cheeks drained of color that mine would never flush with.

Emmett held her almost tenderly even in his ravenous hunger. He cradled her head, his fingers in her fiery red hair.

She grasped onto the collar of his shirt desperately.

His lips pressed to her neck like he was kissing her, and soon her fighting was no longer as arms drooped to hang limp at her sides and the big blue eyes I'd envied moments ago rolled back in her head.

Her skin grew pale and her lips grew white as she swiftly became bloodless and lifeless.

My hands came to my mouth in shock as I watched him hold up her limp body by her chin, her lips parted like she'd just started to scream before she lost consciousness.

My bottom lip trembled and I approached him with otherworldly slowness so I wouldn't startle him.

I was frozen in fear, but I had to do something.

After the red head fell limp into his chest, he let her hang over his arm like a drunken harlot. I reached out at glacial speed to put my hand on his shoulder.

He whirled over his shoulder too quickly for human standards to meet my gaze with a snarl that knocked me back, but it was what happened next that changed everything.

Emmett's powerful protectiveness over the frenzy of his hunt knocked me flat on my back and he was over me in a flash.

I was frozen, just like I'd been in Rochester, but I stared up into his eyes, begging him to come back into them.

He growled, a menacing awful sound, inches from my face and I saw blood still staining his teeth in something out of a horror movie.

My lips parted and my eyes widened, frozen. I trembled, feeling my terror vibrating through my limbs as he crouched over me... His weight on his hands, framing either side of my shoulders.

Vermillion blood tainted the corner of his mouth and my throat burned. I was thankful for it though because the sensation tethered me to the reality of the present.

I clenched my jaw and though it took every bit of control I had over my fear, I buckled down and reached up to ground myself and him tracing my fingers over his mouth to wipe the blood off his lip.

"Rosalie…" Emmett choked out my name, grabbing my wrist, his eyes coming to the tips of my fingers, tainted with her blood.

He came back into his eyes in a painful jolt then, pushing off of me in a flash, stepping back and looking around.

"I… I..." He grimaced the words, wild disembodiment in his eyes, coming to terms with all he'd just done.

That's when I heard it… There'd been onlookers. I heard the word…_ vampire_.

We didn't have much time.

"Emmett…" I cautioned him in a low, cold voice, my eyes stern and serious as I stood to my feet.

We had to catch the onlookers.

"Emmett, you have to listen to me…" I said swiftly, taking his face in my hands before any of the human's reactions could progress into turmoil.

We had to react quickly.

"You have to go kill those people. They saw…" I told him easily as if I was talking about something as simple as going to the store. "Come on."

He just nodded, his eyes an intimidating, awful red color as we turned east, hearing them scrambling through the woods. They couldn't outrun us.

We hunted them like animals, and it felt disgusting and awful to do now. But, I had to.

We had to.

I caught one of them easily by the arm, her dark grey eyes meeting mine with terror as she whirled around, meeting my gaze.

As good as I was at killing, I couldn't bring myself to…

She took a deep breath to scream and I saw the way her veins and arteries wound down her neck. I clenched my jaw.

Emmett, still in his trance, saw my struggle and longed to take the burden from me.

I closed my eyes right as Emmett snapped her neck.

The rest of their scrambling panic stopped within moments. I heard their strangled screams fall into silence and my hand came to my mouth in fear and heartbrokenness.

Moments later, he brought the bodies back to the little clearing, tossing them into the pile of his destruction.

Emmett'd killed another 5 people in just a couple minutes.

His count was increasing and this time it was no one's fault but my own. I hadn't been careful enough. I hadn't kept watch. I hadn't…

As he stood over the tragedy he'd left in his wake, I noticed his pants were still undone and his dishevelment had everything to do with what we'd just done together.

Our closeness seemed a lifetime away. It seemed so far from where we were now.

My embarrassment flooded over me like a wave and my pride was squashed anew.

I couldn't think of how… it felt… touching him because there was one thing he wanted more than me…

Blood.

It was hard to come to terms with the part of him that wanted me was secondary to the predator I'd made him into.

I hated it.

It made me angry.

I was filled with rage, and I was humiliated beyond belief.

My hands clenched into fists. I was shaking.

His eyes fixated on the pile of bodies in front of him emotionlessly.

"I'm sorry." He mumbled, totally monotone.

I didn't respond, still in a sort of shock from all the day's events.

Everything had happened so fast. I crossed my arms over my chest, and this helped me remember that in his blood lust, Emmett had ripped the fabric of my dress so its left side was ragged.

I was ruining so many of my favorite dresses for him.

He started on redoing his pants, his eyes still far off and glazed in his blood drunkenness as he tucked his shirt in.

With the same sort of routine as getting dressed, Emmett began expertly disposing of the bodies so there'd be no trace.

It was silent afterward, an icy, empty silence.

"I told you I was sorry." Emmett's voice was sharp, and he kept his eyes away from me.

He seemed to feel my judgment and shame.

It annoyed me.

I frowned.

"I heard you" I responded sourly.

"And you forgive me?" He tested presumptuously.

Human blood vastly changed him.

He looked at me, his eyes dancing over me in a tragic waltz before his face flooded with an emotion I didn't understand.

We stared at each other in this terrible silence for a long, excruciating moment before his red eyes fell away.

I could forgive him for killing all of those people, but forgiving him for physical rejection… Forgiving him…

For the euphoria in his eyes as he sunk his teeth into that red haired girl's neck outweighing the euphoria I sensed in him during the progression of our physical relationship that had happened today…

Forgiving him for that was awfully hard to do in my self-conscious vanity. I was prideful and miserably desperate for his approval in this area, and this distraction seemed to be a knife in my heart.

I clenched my jaw.

He reached out for me, inviting me into his open arms, but I couldn't.

I couldn't do it.

I was too hurt, and it was the most painful thing in the world when the person you'd run to to comfort you in your hurting is the one that hurt you.

He read it on my face.

"Rosalie, baby, please." He stepped forward, a pet name in his sultry Southern accent making me weak at the knees, but my heartache was too deep to falter now.

I was mortified. Humiliated…

I'd never… been second place to anything.

Ever.

And now, I was… _falling for him_ and he tragically chose blood over me.

It was absurdly _stupid_!

I was angered to the point of absolute blinding rage then.

Vulnerability manifested itself in my spiked, offensive armor as I sourly shrugged him off.

"Don't touch me." I snarled, hating him more with each passing second because he was the face on my insecurity right now.

It was a curious thing how ego, vanity, and self-consciousness and insecurity were so intertwined…

"Rosalie? Come on." He painstakingly ignored my request, taking my face in his hands.

They smelled like humans.

I caught them on his breath.

I hated it.

I hated him.

I hated the part of myself that needed his approval, his attention, his affection…

He let me go then, seeing something in my face that made him realize the importance of it.

"You hurt me." I admitted to him, the words slicing through my throat painfully.

"I know." He swallowed torturously. "I know…"

I turned away from him, tortured by his presence.

"I can't even look at you." I mumbled.

"Then don't." He was pained. "Close your eyes 'cause I wanna talk to you, baby."

I took a deep, exasperated breath, hating how he tried to reason with me, hating how my stomach flipped when he called me baby, hating that I couldn't hate him.

At last though, I turned my back to him and I shut my eyes tight.

"I'm angry with you." I said, and it was shockingly, substantially easier to talk to him like this.

He knew.

"You have every reason to be." He assured me of my rationality.

"I don't… want to go backwards." I growled. "And now… Now you're going to have to go through all of that… _conditioning_ with Carlisle again. Your mind's going to be so… tangled _again_, and you aren't going to be yourself _again. _I'm going to have to watch you go through hell… _again_… and you were just starting… _We_ were just starting…"

"I know, and… God, I hate that part." I heard his voice strain with tension.

I did too.

"But, I let you down." He sighed, these words having profound imprints on him. "That's the worst of it."

I just nodded, keeping my eyes shut and my back to him.

"It disappoints me that I couldn't do right by you, by Carlisle…" He went on, trailing off.

"And… I… Well, it was pretty shitty timing to lose control." His voice was a low rumble in his chest, and I heard him shift his weight forward.

I stiffened hating the pit in my stomach.

"I… really liked _being with you_, Rose. And I'm sorry that was overshadowed by how crummy I am at resisting…" He said, speaking too fast in his nervousness.

"This is hard for me." He admitted, his sentence running together. "I don't have the control you do. I don't have the strength you do. I can't…"

Emmett took a deep breath. I shut my eyes tighter knowing he was potentially not just talking about control regarding blood lust.

"I just… I need you to be patient with me." Emmett expressed. "I know… I know that's asking a lot of you, and that's unfair to do, but that's…"

"That's what I ask of you…" I breathed, finishing his sentence in the way I knew he wouldn't.

He didn't respond immediately.

It stung coming out of my mouth

I heard him shift his weight, seeming to process.

"It's different." He finally mumbled, trying to absolve the space between what he thought and what he said.

"It's not." I shook my head.

"I ask you to be patient with me…" I breathed, letting this resonate in my own thick, terrible skull.

We paused for a moment, and for some awful reason it felt like we were moving apart.

"I care about you, Rosalie…" He started, and I was shocked by how physically close he was to me now after the sensation of moving away from him had seemed so real. "So I'd do anything you asked of me."

In the silence, he put his hand on my shoulder and I tried to keep from melting into his touch.

"I know." I exhaled, believing it, and that's what made it so heartbreaking.

He'd do anything for me, and I was being unreasonable.

It was _my _mind that was a tangle right now…

"And that's what we're promisin' each other we'll do, Rose. Take each other as we are, you know?" He tried to sound optimistic and encouraging, but it rubbed me the wrong way. "Stick it out."

"But is it supposed to be this hard?" I whispered, afraid of saying it out loud.

I hated the thoughts that came to my head next, that it'd never been this difficult for me with anyone else. Things hadn't been so excruciating and painful and heavy with anyone else. I had never had so many hiccups in courtship, and it felt like all odds were stacking against Emmett and I.

Wasn't falling in love supposed to be _easy_?

Maybe we weren't meant to do it…

Maybe _I _couldn't…

"What do you mean?" He asked, his voice low in his chest.

"I mean, there's always… _something_. Some sort of friction, some sort of obstacle, some sort of burden…"

He waited, obviously unsure of what to say, but his hand got heavier on me.

I kept my back to him and my eyes closed, but I melted into him then, and he wrapped his arms around me from behind.

"It won't _always_ be hard for us, Rose." He mumbled.

"But, it's hard _now_." I breathed, a ghostly shiver going through my body.

"We can take it." He said, rubbing a circle on my shoulder where he'd ripped the fabric of my dress. "I told you that earlier."

"You seem so sure." I mumbled.

"Aren't you?" He asked, this seeming to be an important arrangement of words for him.

I paused for a very long moment, waiting on the tangle of my mind to clear, but it was hopeless.

My silence seemed to make him restless.

"Rosalie, stop _torturing_ me." He begged, ducking his head so his lips were at my ear.

It wasn't designed to be sensual, but I definitely felt it that way in my body.

I clenched my jaw, hating the way my very core wanted him.

"Please." He begged me, but this time I heard the heavy seriousness in his voice. "If you care about me at all. Stop it."

He wasn't playing.

"I'm being reasonable thinking about this." I argued.

But maybe I wasn't being reasonable.

After all, I'd never been in love…

Maybe he knew better than I did.

I hated the thought.

"No, you aren't." His voice was strained. "You…"

"I don't know if we can ever stop hurting each other." I breathed heavily, the weight of the words awful and suffocating on my chest.

"Rosalie, come on." He tightened his arm around me and I could feel how desperately he wanted to look into my eyes. "What happened to before? I thought you decided that you were going to try… for me… for us?"

I could tell this wasn't a conversation he was used to having and the desperation in which he spoke of attachment to me seemed to pain him.

I took a deep breath, hating that I was hurting him.

It was hurting me too.

"Do you _really_ think we're meant to do this?… To be together?" I asked, realizing just how afraid I was of his answer.

"Yes!" Emmett's passion when he spoke of things he wanted was unparalleled.

It made me shiver.

"I've always _known_ that. Rosalie, don't you understand? Since that day in the woods, seeing you that first time… flying…"

I clenched my jaw and swallowed.

"You were my angel, and it was so easy to get enchanted by you. You saved me… Gave me a life I couldn't…"

"You're just grateful to me… It's clouding your mind." I mumbled thinking back to the time I spent at his family home, Emmett's devotion to the women that 'saved' him.

"No! Don't tell me what I feel and know, Rosalie." He stepped back and away from me, obviously angered by my clashing objections. "I care about you… deeper than you know. You make it so goddamn hard sometimes, but I still care about you."

I clenched my jaw, hating him stepping away from me and hating even more that he called me out on my shit.

"And I care about you…" I exhaled, feeling that he sincerely doubted it in this moment.

"Then act like it!" His voice rose. "Stop putting me through hell!"

"You put _me_ through hell every time you go back to square one!" I snapped.

"I'm not denying that." He growled."_You_ are the one going back to square one all the time!" He snarled at me, grabbing my arm but I shook him off, shutting my eyes tight. "Just when I finally get close to you, you push me away… _Again_."

I got defensive, crossing my arms in front of my chest.

"But, you're _yet again_ trying to talk yourself out of _being_ with me because I fucked something up. Why are you always doing that?!"

"Here we go _again_. Keeping a running list of my fuck ups so you can justify pushing me away." He went on.

"You sound just like your father when you argue." I said, knowing that would hurt him and remembering hearing his parents arguing when I drove up.

"_Don't you dare_." He growled. "Stop comparing me to my father. You don't know what you're talking about."

"I do. I heard him yell at your mother." I challenged, knowing I was being terrible, but I was doing it anyway.

"Oh my God." His voice rose. "Sometimes you absolutely repulse me."

I felt my icy blood start to boil then.

"Why do you think I can't even look at you?" I complained.

We yelled awful things back and forth at one another until we were breathless.

"Goddamn it Rose. Let yourself be happy. You are the _only_ thing in your way! Don't you see that?" He was pacing behind me, passionately arguing with my back.

I hated the pit in my stomach and I crossed my arms tighter over my chest.

No. There was something else in my way.

He seemed to scarily read my mind.

"You were hurt by someone before and they're exactly who you keep trying to make me into. I'm not them. So stop it. It's not fair to me and you know it."

I snapped my eyes open, whirling around, having to look at him to ground myself by realizing the truth of what he just said.

His black, unruly curly hair that waved to the top of his collar.

His slightly disproportional, but perfect ears that I tucked his too long hair behind sometimes and he'd protest and shake his head seeming to take some boyish insecurity in his ears.

His wide mouth that even in his anger had ghosts of a smile on it, with a frame of dimples that made my dead heart skip.

Not a trace of blonde hair and light eyes and that awful wolf in sheep's clothing smirk.

"Rosalie." Emmett said my name in his perfect, deep voice that was sultry as a Southern sunset.

I swallowed.

He frowned, his awful red eyes darting over my face.

"You don't know what you're talking about." I shot back before I could even think.

"No, because I have to always _guess_ with you." He raised an eyebrow. "Talk. to. me."

Something dark and deep in me rejected him even when I was also so outwardly full of desire for him. I was frustrated with myself – angry.

But, mostly I was ashamed.

"It's pointless to talk now. I'll have to wait until human blood is out of your system to get the chance to speak with you rationally again."

He growled in exasperation, clenching his hands into fists and pacing in a quick circle around himself as his hands rose over his head in a sort to tantrum.

It proved my point, but it was indeed perfectly rational for him to react this way.

I was being awful.

I just couldn't stop.

I felt vulnerable.

"Fuck, Rosalie!" He clenched his hands into fists again pressing them over his eyes, obviously not wanting me to see him emotional.

My stomach dropped as I watched him deflate. He was exhausted with me.

I was terrible.

I was afraid he would leave me.

I felt powerless.

But, I wasn't.

So I reached out to him, putting my hand on his shoulder, asking…

He shrugged me off though and I thought I could die right there.

"Rosalie, _please_. Stop messing with my head." He begged me, a sad desperation in his voice. "I can't take it anymore."

"You wish you were human. You wish you had all those things from your fancy, perfect life before. You are comparing me to someone else and you wish I was him, or… I don't know you wish I didn't remind you of him… Either way... _You won't let go_. You're still... holding on and it kills me. You wish you hadn't saved me and drug me into this… But _this_ is what happened." He said in a strained voice, tilting his head up to the sky but keeping his fists over his eyes.

"_You_ chose this. You used me, and now that you think you know me… _I don't know_… You're _deciding_ you don't want this anymore and you're blaming _me_ for it." His voice was full of emotion, pulling to different levels on this high of an emotional pitch.

"That's not what I'm doing." I breathed, but he dismissed, shaking his head.

"I know this isn't fair to ask of you, but please… Do this for me. You can be sad… But please, I'm begging you to do this for me because I can't live without you. I won't." He pleaded but he wouldn't look at me. "I want to be with you. Can you do that for me? Please?"

I clenched my jaw just staring at him.

"You are selfish and vile and manipulative and… sometimes I look at you and all I see is that ugly, black spot on your heart that makes you torture me!" He told me, his hands unclenching from fists and the heels of his hands pressing into his eyes. "Sometimes I actually, whole heartedly _hate you!_"

I'd never seen a man cry before, and though vampires couldn't produce tears, this felt an awful lot like what it would be like to watch him cry.

There was absolutely nothing worse in the entire world.

I'd felt pain before, but the pain of watching him suffer…

There was nothing that hurt as much as that…

"But God, in spite of all that…. _I love you!_"

He said this strongly, but with tenderness I couldn't comprehend as he dropped his hands and looked over at me desperately.

It was the sweetest arrangement of words I'd ever heard and my ears rang with their glorious sound.

"You make it so hard sometimes… But I love you." He said again.

I took quick, shallow breaths that barely filled my chest.

I was frozen.

"I don't wanna lose you." Emmett said heavily. "I lose everything. And everyone."

I heard him like he was a thousand miles away, the words looping through my mind.

"Please." He whispered.

That's when two years of my cold exterior came crashing down and I covered my face.

"I'm sorry." He repeated softly, but he wasn't apologizing for these moments.

This was all the assurance I needed.

He was apologizing for what had made me unable to love and experience receiving love. He was apologizing for my need for reservations and desperation in masking vulnerability. He was apologizing for my fear. He was apologizing for the wounds he had nothing to do with but wanted to stitch up for me. He was apologizing for the weight of my past, and insisting on bearing my burdens.

This forced me into a spiral of emotions I couldn't process or understand, but instinctually they felt like the most natural feelings to ever be housed in my body.

"I think I love you too." I said on pure impulse to the labyrinth of feelings aforementioned.

His eyes darted and searched over my face, but he kept his hands by his sides. I couldn't believe what I'd just said and his confused expression suggested he couldn't believe it either.

I took a running start, jumping to wind my body around his and crash into a kiss full of passion and desperation. I wrapped my legs and arms around him like vines, holding him to me.

We'd never kissed like this. Nothing had ever felt like this. Our hands were grasping at each other, and I pulled away just to correct myself.

"No, Emmett, I know I _love_ you." I said, winding tighter to him as he pressed my back into a nearby tree, kissing down my neck.

Where we often stuttered in communicating with words, physical touch seemed to make up for it in this moment.

We were communicating perfectly with our bodies.

I kissed him again.

He was pleased with what he heard and the position we'd found ourselves in, and I wanted to please him further after all the torture I'd just inflicted upon him.

"I love you." I said confidently, but my hands started to shake as I started on the buttons of my dress, making myself exposed to him.

He pulled his suspenders off his shoulders and I knew I was shaking as my feet touched the floor again and his hands explored under the fabric of my dress. I sighed against his mouth as his hand spread over the lace of my bra.

We kissed, hard and fast and desperately wanting.

It felt good. It felt right, and I knew exactly what was motivating my desire as I longed to proceed.

I slipped his shirt over his head, practically melting as my hands met the muscular planes of his bare back.

That gave him the go-ahead to try something new as his hand crawled up my skirt.

My knees buckled the moment his fingers found the lace between my legs and he smiled against my mouth.

"Make love to me." I said in a tiny, frightened voice wishing with everything in me that I'd sound more confident than I felt.

I was shaky and nervous as my hands reached for the button of his pants.

"What are you doing?" He asked, pulling away and searching my face.

"I love you." I wasn't privy to the details on how physical intimacy should occur and I wasn't sure if he was offended that I'd started on his pants. Maybe he was supposed to do that part.

I was uncertain and my head was cloudy.

He looked into my eyes for a long, terrifying, hanging moment then he sighed.

"Shit. Godmotherfuckingdammit." He cursed a string of curse words too foul for me to even process as he pushed me away and turned his head. "Gimme a second."

A few long seconds later, it appeared he collected himself.

He paced in a circle then returned to me, taking my face in his hands. He took a deep breath then, pressing his forehead to mine. I could feel his exasperation.

"You don't have to do that, Rosalie." He said in a low voice, pained, as if what he was saying just about killed him.

"Do what?" I practically panted, out of breath as I anxiously approached this boundary for myself.

"You don't have to prove it to me." His tone was even and calm as he traced a pattern on my cheek, innocent and removed.

I was silent as I retreated, unsure and humiliated.

"I mean, obviously I_ want_ you to." He said, his eyes darting down guiltily.

I clenched my jaw, irresolute as to how I was feeling in this moment. On one hand, I felt worthless and mortified. On the other, I felt more valued and cherished than I had in my entire life.

"But, you don't _have_ to." He reached out for me taking my hand and thus lifting my gaze. "Not like that… when you don't really want to. You're terrified."

"What?!" I protested. "I _do_ want to!"

"You're trembling." He breathed.

"That doesn't matter." I said too quickly and too high pitched. "I love you."

"It matters to me."He responded plainly, raising his eyebrow as if he was observing something I couldn't see. "And, I... love you. God, so much more than you know... But, like, I said – you don't have to prove it to me."It angered me.

"I'm not proving _anything_ to you." I said sharply as I stood to my feet.

"If not to me, then to yourself." He shrugged, seeing into my soul as he looked down at me.


	23. Dog Days Are Over (Part I)

Quick note: Thank you endlessly for your reviews and encouragement! It makes me SO HAPPY to see your responses! Thank you for investing in me and this story! In this uncertain time, I hope this story provides you some sort of escape or comfort. I'm sending all my love to you all.

Side note: PLEASE BE STAYING HEALTHY AND TAKING CARE OF YOURSELVES!

Please consider leaving a review! Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

TW/CW: just a little light classism/ racism issues touched on here

* * *

**_Dog Days Are Over_**

_Happiness, hit her like a train on a track_  
_Coming towards her, stuck still no turning back_  
_She hid around corners and she hid under beds_  
_She killed it with kisses and from it she fled_  
_With every bubble she sank with a drink_  
_And washed it away down the kitchen sink_

_The dog days are over_  
_The horses are coming so you better run_

_Run fast for your mother run fast for your father_  
_Run for your children for your sisters and brothers_  
_Leave all your love and your longing behind you_  
_Can't carry it with you if you want to survive_

* * *

**Dorothy**

_1931_

"Come on!" Emmett took my hand as we ran through the fields recklessly.

"Slow down! I can't run that fast." I laughed, but tossed my head back in a euphoria I didn't know how to explain.

"Well, we got places to be, Dorothy!" He grinned so his dimples deepened in his cheeks as he winked in my direction.

As the sparks of a bonfire began to light up in our sight line, my stomach flipped.

Emmett was the rebellious one.

He was sweet as honey and good through and through, but he was wild as a buck.

Everybody from here to the state line knew it.

He was far more comfortable sneaking out and breaking our parents' rules than I was and I worried they'd know we'd gone to a party outside of town.

Emmett stood just as tall as our father now and was still growing like a weed, but that didn't stop our father from still knocking Emmett around, and Emmett let him - for the most part.

Emmett's black eye darkened around his eye socket as I looked over at him thinking how just yesterday Emmett'd gotten his lights knocked out for something so minuscule I'd already forgotten what it was.

Em caused trouble like a habit, and took those consequences nonchalantly.

Me though, I was afraid of consequences to misbehaving, so I didn't dare.

Until now.

A fiddle or two, some crude drums and a harmonica echoed through the midnight air. My breath burned in my chest excitedly as I saw groups of people begin to grow clearer in my vision.

Now, I was excited. More excited than nervous.

Emmett and I ran freely, and I picked my knees up high in this tall grass as I followed his trail.

As we slowed to a walk approaching the bonfire, Emmett let go of my hand right as June Pritchett squealed in her running start to jump into his arms, wrapping her legs around his waist and kissing him proper.

I rolled my eyes, turning away. I would've tossed my lunch if I'd eaten any.

You'd think she had some tact kissing my brother for the whole town to see…

But then again, she was probably kissing him like that so the other girls here _would_ see and be too intimidated to try anything.

They still would though.

There were very few things in this world that I hated, but watching women around Emmett was one of them.

Every girl within a 50 mile radius was immediately made wild about him. It made it very difficult for me to have girl friends…

But then again, Emmett said the same thing about me and the reason he couldn't have male friends too… I didn't see it, but he insisted every guy in town was just dizzy over me.

I wasn't impressed.

"Well my oh my, hello to you too, Miss June." Emmett grinned.

"You been fightin' again, Em?" Her big, round green eyes darted over his face, seeing his black eye and stitched up brow as she unwound herself from him.

"Always." He told her, obviously wanting to dismiss the subject. "Now you've saved a dance for me right?"

Emmett reached into his pockets to produce a cigarette and some matches. As he hung a cigarette from his lips, June reached up under her skirt.

Emmett raised an eyebrow.

I was mortified.

She produced a flask, winking as she handed it to him. I realized that 'dance' was code for alcohol…

Her daddy was a moonshiner, but he still looked down on our family like we were a bunch of no-good trash.

We were poor, but so was everyone else around here. The reason Emmett wasn't good enough for June, in her father's eyes, was that he was half Irish…

Still in a rebellion against her father, she'd been seeing Emmett for the better half of the spring. You could see the flush of young love in her face, but it was definitely far from his.

The girl that had his attention most was actually the town preacher's daughter, Dolly Reed.

I knew he liked her because she made it difficult for him, and girls most often never did.

Dolly Reed was beautiful sure, but she was distant and that's what seemed to attract Emmett's attention most.

And, it didn't hurt that she had long blonde hair and legs up to her neck.

Mama didn't approve because she wasn't Catholic, but she was better than the gals he usually hung around, so she didn't say anything about it.

Of course she wouldn't be here at this party though, so he was free to flirt with whomever he wanted.

"Emmett." I scolded, knowing he'd gotten in trouble with the laws just last week for drinking.

I didn't understand his fixation.

"Oh lighten up, Dorothy." He dismissed, taking a long drink.

"It's not all bad." June tried to reason with me, tucking her curly chocolate brown behind her ear. "And Prohibition don't exist this far outta town."

Emmett grinned at her, then took a long drag of his cigarette, seeming to glow in a way I hadn't seen him glow in a long time.

It had nothing to do with June and everything to do with getting away from the crushing pressures of hard work and a mean as a snake father.

We were free for the night.

"Come on, celebrate." He put his arm around my shoulders and offered me the flask.

I looked at it for a long while, thinking about all the awful things our father did when he drank and not really wanting to partake.

"Maybe later." I looked up at Em, communicating with my eyes in a way only twins could communicate.

"All right then." He nodded, satisfied, but kept his arm around my shoulder as we walked over to the party.

June crossed her arms over her chest, walking away from us. I knew what Emmett was doing and I snickered privately.

He didn't want to look committed to her in case there were other options at this party. But then again, he really wasn't committed to her. He wasn't committed to anyone.

People were hooping and hollering and dancing at the party, and I realized then, a smile had spread across my face.

"Well, looks like they'll just invite any old crumb to these clam bakes." Harry Wilson teased Emmett familiarly, and Emmett unwound his arm from me to shove Harry's shoulder with a playful laugh.

"Well, you're lookin' mighty swell, Dorothy." Harry ran a hand through his hair and grinned at me flirtatiously, once he'd escaped. "Happy birthday."

"Hey hey hey, keep your lousy peepers off my sister." Emmett raised his eyebrows, but he wasn't joking.

Harry stepped back with his hands up, but kept his eyes fighting for mine.

My gaze though was already looking for someone else, and my stomach was filled with butterflies of anticipation…

I saw him, on the outskirts of the party, dancing. He was… luminous.

Sam Sanders tossed his head back, laughing fully and freely as he moved to the music alongside a small group of his friends and his kid sister, Ira. She was just a year younger than us, but she was skinny as a rail, tiny framed, and had a sing-songy high pitched voice so everybody called her Baby.

Sam caught my gaze from across the field.

I attached myself to Emmett's side, my legs feeling weak all of a sudden.

Emmett was tragically social in this moment of my own haste. He was charismatic and magnetic, so everyone had _something_ to say to us, but we eventually made our rounds and when Emmett's second cigarette was out, it was time.

Emmett was grinning wide, his arm around my shoulder as we walked over. I was thankful for his arm around my shoulder though as it helped steady my nerves.

Some of the others in the group watched us with caution as their dancing slowed, their dark eyes heavy on us. I was too naive to know they were apprehensive to why white people would be approaching them, and afraid we were going to ask them to leave.

"Well, would you look at that. You finally made it!" Sam grinned over at us, dispelling the tension as we approached.

"Better late than never, I always say." Emmett snickered as he clapped Sam on the back, hugging him close to the wide eyes of just about everyone at this shindig.

Emmett and Sam didn't care though.

And, neither did I.

"Though, we would've been on time if Dorothy hadn't braided her hair. It takes 'bout a thousand years."

"Well, it's certainly lovely." Sam complimented easily, his rich, velvet voice making my heart skip a beat. "Baby said Caroline was out pickin' flowers for you all day."

"Thank you." I twisted my hair around my fingers, grinning as I thought about braiding the flowers in so he'd notice.

I caught Sam's eyes in a way that made me wonder…

"Hey Em, Hey Dorothy." Baby appeared at Sam's side. "Happy birthday."

"Lord, you get prettier every day, Baby. You tell me if any boys'er givin' you trouble, you hear?" Emmett grinned reaching to put his arm around her.

She rolled her eyes, but accepted his kiss on the cheek. "I'll be sure to let you know when a boy pays me _any _attention."

I saw she had her gaze on the guy in the center of the dancing circle. I didn't know him; he must have been from the other side of town.

"Oh, you know I'd give you all the attention in the world, if Sam wasn't so protective of you." Emmett teased her playfully. "_And_, if that guy wasn't already staring at you. He's so jealous of me, havin my arm around you."

"What guy?" Baby's eyes went wide, but she tittered like a school girl.

"You know very well what guy. Go get 'em." Emmett urged.

Baby hugged to his side, loving him like he was her second brother, and she lit up in laughter.

I half wondered if that's what Sam thought about me…

I hoped desperately that Sam didn't think of me as his sister.

I blushed.

"Stay out of trouble, Em." She winked before heading back to the dancing, filled with confidence.

Emmett had a way of doing that to people, filling them with boldness. I hoped it would rub off on me next.

I watched her approach the guy she'd had her sights set on, and he offered his hand, twirling her under it.

I wished I could be so bold.

The music was contagious and braided through the air and made it difficult not to want to join in on the dancing too.

Sam caught my lingering gaze on all the dancing, and I took a deep breath.

"Emmett… You… uh, wouldn't mind too much if I asked Dorothy to dance with me, would you? It being a special occasion and all." Sam drug the toe of his boot in the sand shyly.

My heart thudded in my chest, and I twisted my hands together in front of me, begging him with my gaze and hoping he could feel it, but not too obviously.

Emmett froze, his big brown eyes wide. He'd actually been taken aback, seeing clearly for the very first time...

Sam didn't think of me as a sister... or a friend...

It was the edge of something more.

"You wanna dance with him, Dorothy?" Emmett asked, evident nervousness in his voice as he practically combusted.

Sam was his best friend. We'd grown up together swimming in the creek, teasing each other, playing pranks...

But now...

I nodded, not exhaling yet. I was still nervous.

Emmett read it all over my face. He knew how I felt.

Then, his dimples showed happily on his cheeks, deepening around the corners of his soft smile.

"Just don't step on her feet or I'll kill ya, you cement mixer." Emmett teased Sam about his dancing, trying to break through the awkwardness, but Emmett's usually humor filled voice held an edge of deep seriousness.

I exhaled.

"I won't. I swear to you, Em." Sam said powerfully, and I knew then that they were talking about more than dancing.

Emmett reached in his pocket to produce another cigarette, lighting it in his anxious habit, but he nodded us off his with his blessing.

I was floating on air then, and Sam held out his hand.

I took it, my heart feeling heavy and light all in the same moment.

I was nervous.

When he twirled me under his arm and into a close, dancing position, I was breathless.

I looked up into his eyes, melting into the depths of them.

"You look beautiful, Dorothy." He said, honey sweetness dripping off the sound.

"Thank you." I said, still nervous.

But, he grinned down at me, and all that nervousness dispelled.

I stepped closer to him in this moment of comforted bliss, nothing else in the world mattering.

"I know it doesn't quite compare to the flowers Caroline picked for you, but…" His focus dropped as he fished in his pocket to produce a little crinkled wildflower for me.

Butterflies flew through my center and I smiled.

"It's beautiful." I commented. "I love it."

In this phrase though, I'd told him I loved him.

And, God, I already meant it. Our souls were made of the same fiber.

"May I?" He asked charmingly before he tucked the flower into my long, raven black curls.

* * *

_Present_

"Do you like it?" The hairdresser turned me around to face the mirror with a hopeful smile.

As the chair turned, I caught sight of all the black hair lying piled in the floor and I was intimidated, swallowing my nervousness before I caught the girl in the mirror.

I gasped, both my hands coming to my mouth in shock.

I didn't recognize myself.

"Oh no. It'll grow back!" Vera comforted me from the side of the room, rocking her new baby, Lillian in her arms to keep her entertained.

I just nodded, my hands moving now to my perfectly curled black hair that had been cut from my lower back to bobbed at the middle of my neck.

24 inches of hair was lying in the floor around the barber's chair.

I remembered braiding and unbraiding my hair a thousand times over.

1, 2, 3.

Over, under, over, under.

I remembered Ruthie hiding underneath the black curtain of it while I told her a story.

I remembered Emmett tugging on the end of my braid to tease me as he passed by.

I remembered Sam putting a flower behind my ear and into my long, loose curls...

My heart began to beat faster and faster in my chest and my eyes started to water.

"Oh, I can't have anybody crying in my chair." The hairdresser went on, nervously wringing her hands. "I think you look beautiful. It looks swell, truly!"

"Do you like it?" I asked Vera turning toward her in anticipation.

"I love it." She gave me a nice, kind smile. "Really."

"Really?" I confirmed, turning my head this way and that.

I wasn't used to how light my head felt whether it was the hair or my nerves.

"It's so stylish. It's how everyone's wearing their hair these days in Europe." The hairdresser tried to claim.

"It's different." Vera confirmed, warmth in her eyes.

Henry peeked his head around her legs, playing a game of peek a boo with himself in the mirror and giggling wildly, asking her to look.

He tried to pick up some of my hair from the floor, but Vera scolded him. He was getting rambunctious.

I exhaled.

"It's different." I settled.

As I caught my reflection, it wasn't the only thing that was different and as drastic as that haircut had been that wasn't the most drastic change in me.

The bruises had faded, the scabs had healed. They were a long gone nightmare.

My lips were rosy pink to match the healthy color in my cheeks. My figure had filled out a bit so I almost had a little shape, and it was especially accentuated with the new yellow dress I wore.

But, where I saw the change the most was in my eyes.

They sparkled a little.

Yes, my eyes had seen sadness and unimaginable horror, but they looked... hopeful in the thought that maybe there was still some good left for me. I was optimistic that darkness wasn't all I would know.

Vivien gave me that.

"I love it." I breathed, turning to the hairdresser. "I needed different."

"You did." Vera agreed with a knowing smile.

As Vera and I were walking home later, the streets were beautifully festive with Halloween decorations and a little nip in the air made the tips of our ears and noses turn pink.

I curled inside my jacket, and reached to make sure Lillian was bundled up enough in her carriage.

October was a beautiful time of year, filled with the newness of autumn, change evident in every breath.

I'd never experienced an autumn like this though. There weren't this many colors in the South. Now every tree was dressed for the occasion.

Vera stopped in her tracks a couple blocks from home, taking a sharp inhale as we approached

_"Beware: Ghost of Rosalie Hale"_ was painted in red to look like blood on the side of a mailbox.

Though, it took me a while to put the letters together, I was proud to read it, even if it was an ominous message. I had been practicing every day and reading to Henry and Lillian really did help me learn. Vera was a patient, loving teacher and I didn't feel judged by her as I told her I'd never really gone to school.

A man a little older than my father was scrubbing the paint away furiously, keeping his head down to avoid conversation, even as Vera and I approached.

I heard young teens and mischievous boys on bikes whispering and tittering as they passed by the house that had been deemed haunted.

"Robert." Vera approached the man tentatively.

The man looked up, his eyes as grey as his hair was turning. He would've been a very handsome man about 10 years ago, but stress and age wore on his face and weighed on the edges of his mouth.

"Mrs. Fitzgerald." He nodded, his voice full of emotion I didn't understand as he looked over Vera with ancient familiarity and an odd sadness.

"And Miss McCarty." Vera introduced me. "My guest."

"How do you do?" I extended my gloved hand, my mousy voice vibrating in my throat nervously as I read the man's tragic energy.

"I think of your family often." Vera said, her voice trembling slightly and her eyes darting down to the ground.

"I heard about your new daughter. Congratulations." The man spoke with pain seeming to redirect.

His eyes lingered on the pink blanket and the baby carriage I was pushing.

"Can I see her?" He asked Vera with heartbroken wonder and want.

Vera nodded, reaching in the carriage to produce a beautiful bundle of perfect pink.

I couldn't help but smile as I looked at her.

The man named Robert's breath caught in his throat and he cleared it to keep from getting emotional.

"Her name's Lillian." Vera whispered and this meant something to this man named Robert as his eyes got glassy.

"I know Rosalie would've loved that." Robert murmured, his voice seeming to ache in his mouth.

Vera just nodded, returning the baby to its carriage.

"I pray for you every day." Vera whispered privately.

Robert nodded.

"Be safe walking home." He warned with a fire in his eyes. "Would you like for me to escort you?"

It was the middle of the afternoon. No one would even think about needing an escort.

But, he seemed to operate with irrational cautiousness.

"We'll be all right, Mr. Hale." Vera acknowledged and I put the pieces together then.

Rosalie was _his_ ghost and something tragic had befallen her.

I didn't ask about Vera's odd exchange this afternoon, but I heard her cry in the bathroom when we got home and I was getting dinner ready.

My chest ached knowing that there was pain around me I couldn't fix, and the ghost of Rosalie Hale haunted me throughout the evening and until I got the children into bed.

As I finished my duties and retired to my bedroom, I noticed Vera was already sitting on the chair at my vanity before I walked in.

"She was my best friend." Vera began, her face pale in the moonlight.

I was still shocked to see her in my room as she turned to look at me, but I was also taken aback with Vera's opening up to me.

"She's been gone for a couple years now, but it hurts like it was yesterday." Vera went on.

"I'm so sorry." I swallowed, shutting the door behind me as I knew she wanted to have a private conversation with me.

I could hear her husband listening to FDR downstairs on the radio.

Vera just nodded.

"That was her father we saw today."

"He seemed very sad." I nodded, responding only as I knew how to, with observations.

"Every year around this time is hard for the Hales because the kids in town want to make Rosalie into some sort of ghost…"

"Her death was… _scandalous_, but... it just doesn't make sense." Vera exhaled, a lone tear dripping down her cheek.

I clenched my teeth nervously.

"Her life was perfect. She had everything she wanted... She was... happy." Vera emphasized. "I just... I didn't see it coming when she… killed herself… I should've seen it coming..."

"You can't blame yourself." I said softly.

"But I do." Vera exhaled. "I still do."

I had an urge to hug Vera, and so I did and she cried into my shoulder as I provided a shred of comfort to her darkness.

"_I_ was the last person to see her alive." Vera sniffled. "She was… so _happy_ that night… That's what I kept telling the police… Her fiancé… Her parents…"

"Sometimes... I think..." Vera took a sharp inhale as she cried. "I think... Oh, God I just sound insane."

Vera had been struggling getting back to normal after having Lillian and her mind sent her to dark depths of depression more often than not.

I worried this was another episode.

She was especially thankful to have me to help her through it and make sure the house was kept and the children were taken care of. Her depression reminded me a lot of my mother, though Vera processed hers in softness and my mother was just distant and cold.

Vera's heart was heavy now though for an external reason.

"No, it's okay." I tried to comfort her, searching her face for answers. "I'm here to listen."

"I think... I think she was murdered." Vera exhaled. "I know this sounds crazy, but it's late and I'm tired and I'll forget about it in the morning I swear to it. I'm just tired, and I can't talk about this to anyone else…"

I frowned.

"What makes you think that she was killed?" I asked in a ghostly tone, halfway assuming that perhaps she was just getting swept up in the morbidity of the holiday.

However, I saw the seriousness in her eyes and it made me shiver. I was sincere though, as I was here to listen and help her process this.

"It sounds like some of those stupid stories all the kids tell around here... So, there's no one to talk to about it _rationally_. I wouldn't want to bring it up to her parents either... after all they've been through, and they finally got it all settled with the police and... and..." Vera began to cry.

"It's just... It doesn't make sense. Her life was perfect. She had so much to look forward to, and..."

It broke my heart to see her in so much pain and I stroked her hair in comfort knowing through an experience with an old friend that there was often intense brokenness behind strong people. Rosalie Hale must've been a similar case.

Vera and I had become fast friends and I saw so much hope in her and her family, so I felt her sadness radiating through me now.

"And... She'd asked me that night what I was going to wear to her wedding..." Vera said in a breath. "She was so thrilled about it. Her fiancé, Royce was... well, he was exactly what she wanted. He would've provided for her. She'd come to see Henry... She wanted children of her own. She even said so... _that very evening_."

I frowned, something about this striking a nerve though I couldn't quite uncover it yet.

"Things got quiet for a little while... Until more people started mysteriously dying this past year." Vera swallowed nervously. "The sons of all the wealthiest men in town..."

"Right before he died, Royce... showed up here. He wanted to know if I'd seen her..." Vera's tears got heavier. "He was crazed. I'd never seen a man like that... I'd met him once before... He was calm and collected. He was of excellent breeding, and well mannered. He was so… _cool_. He wasn't… insane."

A terrible metallic taste in my mouth caused me to sit back.

"Rosalie had been dead for two years... But, he insisted... well, he insisted that Rosalie was coming to kill him." Vera's voice shook. "He wanted to know if I'd seen her, if she'd called..."

"I know this is..." Vera grimaced.

"No, please continue." My eyes were wide as saucers and my heart was racing in my chest.

Vera took a deep breath.

"He was found stone cold three days later. They identified his body based on dental records." Vera said hauntingly with a bone chilled shiver. "That's… pretty much all that was left of him."

"And whoever... or _whatever_ did it... broke through a safe, the best locks and security that money could buy... The coroner's report couldn't even be printed in the paper it was so gruesome." Vera made a face. "And...rumor has it whoever did it left a wedding dress."

My stomach sank and immediately I thought I was going to throw up. My world was spinning.

"That's absurd." I mumbled, my brain a tangle as I took in all this information.

It wasn't settling right.

"It's just a bunch of scary stories and wild conspiracies." Vera wiped her eyes. "But... but still, I wonder..."

She was burdened heavily by this and I clenched my jaw.

"I wonder if... if Royce killed her. I wonder if she really did come back, to haunt him… I don't know if I even believe in all this ghost nonsense but..." Vera breathed. "I... I mean, if she left a wedding dress, was she trying to let us know he'd done it?..."

I shivered and the room started to spin.

_"They all eventually got their justice." Vivien said triumphantly. _

I thought of her words, her story...

"I'm getting feverish and exhausted..." Vera placed her face in her hands. "I'm sorry I bothered you with this nonsense."

I was speechless, no words coming to my throat. They were blocked by adrenaline.

"It's not nonsense." I finally squeaked out, not knowing what to do with my spinning mind. "I'm always here to talk."

"I'm just tired and I've been hearing too many scary stories around this cursed holiday." Vera exhaled. "I'm going to lie down."

"Goodnight." I breathed.

As she closed the door behind her, I frowned, not able to shake my nervousness. I was unnerved the rest of the night, sleep not finding me as I lied awake in a terrified insomnia.

My mind was sifting through information furiously, making absurd connections.

But maybe they weren't as absurd as I had thought…

Vivien's face flashed through my mind. I thought of her impossibly cold skin, her eerie golden eyes...

It was too coincidental. Right?

But Vivien had sent me here. Of all places she sent me here. With Vera. With Henry...

With her name...

Vivien was Rosalie Hale...

The realization crashed through my mind like a bolt of lightning.

Rosalie Hale had sent me here, to her friend Vera's house. The one a couple of blocks from her family home, and just down the street from where she was raped by Royce King and his friends.

They'd left her for dead, thinking they'd killed her and gotten away with it, but now... now they'd gotten their justice.

Rosalie wasn't dead. She was alive and somehow, through some cosmic coincidence, I'd found out.

Unless it wasn't coincidence. Unless it was planned. Unless she'd _hoped_ I'd found out.

I knew the truth now, but would it even matter.

What could I do with this information? Who would believe me?

That's when the thought entered in my head like a clang of pots against each other…

If she wasn't dead… neither was he.

I felt in my very bones.

Emmett was alive.

I thought intently on all the pieces of information Vivien… er, Rosalie Hale had given me and how that could fit together. It was a puzzle I would solve because I knew in my gut it'd lead me to Emmett.

My heart pounded in my chest, and I didn't sleep well that night.

The next morning, I was silent as I made tea, handing the cup to Vera before I picked Henry up to get his breakfast.

"Are you all right?" Vera's soft voice shattered through the tangle of my mind.

"Did you ever have a friend named Vivien Leigh?" I asked, my voice shaking in my throat.

Vera snickered a little, and this reaction confused me.

"The movie star?" She raised an eyebrow. "You know, that's who people in town say you look like."

My stomach flipped.

I didn't want Vera to think I was crazy, and honestly thinking about it in the daylight, I thought I might be. I mean, the stories sounding so similar was just a coincidence…

But this, made me wonder.

"Oh, that must be where I heard the name." I shrugged, trying to play it off with a little chuckle.

I wondered now, in the clarity of a new day if Rosalie Hale had told me her story and given me her name just as a comforting clue to connect with me about running from abuse and starting over - to show me it can be done, and life can go on.

No one know but me…

But, Rosalie Hale was not dead.

Dorothy McCarty might've died in Tennessee, but she was alive and well as Rosalie McCarty, and I would live on in Rosalie Hale's mind just as she would live on in mine as Vivien Leigh.

Royce King's death could've been just a coincidence… Someone after his money… A debt he owed… And, they wanted to cover it up by connecting it to the town legend of Rosalie Hale.

Rosalie… Vivien… might have just heard the story in the news and _imagined_ that was justice, even if it wasn't her vengeance.

But even if _that_ was true, Rosalie's story about how she met Emmett still didn't add up… What _really_ connected them?

This was the key hole in the story.

If Vivien was Rosalie, then her father was not in the lumber business and she did _not_ meet Emmett through a business deal.

So, how then, did it happen?

It wasn't a chance encounter.

He was in prison.

Right?

What other information could be that missing link…

Possibilities flooded through my mind that were each more fanciful than the last.

I tried desperately to shake the thoughts for now, knowing I needed to run some errands for Vera after I got Henry his breakfast.

And, I wanted to have enough time to send a letter of my own... To the address Vivien had given me to write to if I needed anything.

I was still learning penmanship and forming letters, but I did my very best, and I knew the message would get across...

It had to.

* * *

_Vivien,_

_I pray you understand the depths of my gratitude for all you've done to help me craft a life I could've only once dreamed here in Rochester. Vera and her family have welcomed me with open arms, and shown me hospitality I don't deserve. _

_Vera just had another baby, a little girl with beautiful blue eyes. You would absolutely adore her. Her name is Lillian. She's a quiet, sweet baby that's always smiling. Henry is growing beautifully. He grows curiouser every day, and his dark curly hair and dimples so remind me of my brother Emmett. It is nice to have a reminder of him here, a reminder of home. _

_There's something in my soul still holding on to hope that Emmett's still alive, and I suppose that's why I'm so quick to believe my gut on this one..._

_I know who you are. _

_And, it will be a secret I take to my grave. Just as you're protecting me, I'm protecting you._

_I know you're still afraid. _

_But Rosalie Hale, I ask this with a pleading, desperate heart. _

_Tell me the truth about my brother. _

_Please._

_I have to know the truth._


	24. Dog Days Are Over (Part II)

Quick note: Thank you endlessly for your reviews and encouragement! It makes me SO HAPPY to see your responses! Thank you for investing in me and this story! In this uncertain time, I hope this story provides you some sort of escape or comfort. I'm sending all my love to you all.

This chapter is again from Dorothy's perspective. While I do love writing Dorothy, she has just absolutely come into her own and her story has developed far beyond what I initially imagined so I think I might have to make another story for her as a sequel/ spin off. I really wanted Rosalie and Emmett's love story to be the primary focus of this fic, but this chapter, Dorothy just kind of took over and as much as I tried to edit her story down to a side character, she's just becoming deeper and deeper to me. I tried to make her finding out about the connections between Vivien and Rosalie and Emmett feel rushed only because I wanted to keep Dorothy a side character and this complication being a side story, but she's not going down without a fight and there are more layers and characters added in this chapter that I fell in love with and want their own stories told.

We're back to RxEm next chapter, but I don't think this is the last we'll see of Dorothy. Honestly, I'm really happy on how this chapter is developing another side to Rosalie, so we'll see...

Side note: PLEASE BE STAYING HEALTHY AND TAKING CARE OF YOURSELVES!

Please consider leaving a review! Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

TW/CW: fighting, historical racism/ classism touched on here, reference to abortion, torture

* * *

**_Dog Days Are Over_**

_Happiness, hit her like a train on a track_  
_Coming towards her, stuck still no turning back_  
_She hid around corners and she hid under beds_  
_She killed it with kisses and from it she fled_  
_With every bubble she sank with a drink_  
_And washed it away down the kitchen sink_

_The dog days are over_  
_The horses are coming so you better run_

_Run fast for your mother run fast for your father_  
_Run for your children for your sisters and brothers_  
_Leave all your love and your longing behind you_  
_Can't carry it with you if you want to survive_

* * *

**Dorothy**

_February, 1935_

I remember when we were young my mother once said to me while she braided my hair and my father was beating the shit out of Emmett in the yard that while some kids need discipline, Emmett needed an exorcist.

She marveled that as much good as he had in him, he was absolutely possessed with the need to rebel against anyone and anything. He couldn't shake the devil on his shoulder that told him to push the limits.

I didn't see it then, thinking he was more than justified in most everything he did, but these past few weeks, I saw it plain as day.

He rebelled just for the hell of it.

Blood stained Emmett's teeth as he laughed devilishly, flat on his back in the center of the fighting pit.

I saw what my mother meant then about the exorcist in the wildness of Emmett's eyes… He had to be utterly deranged.

It sent a shiver down my spine as the man standing over him gave him a quick hard kick to the gut.

"You're s'posed to be the best fighter this side'a the state line." The man growled.

Emmett gasped at the impact, but coughed out another crazed laugh.

I pushed forward, desperate to get to him, but it was no use. Strong arms held me back from the edges of the ring.

"Em." I whispered, feeling his pain through some sort of cosmic connection.

I hoped he couldn't feel mine.

It'd be too much to bear.

I'd seen him fight before. I'd watched him bleed…

But, things were different now.

Caroline had just died. Elizabeth followed shortly after, and this blow to Emmett's heart had seemed fatal.

He hadn't been the same since the day he lowered Beth's coffin into the ground.

We all hadn't. Beth was the best of us.

She was beautiful, and kind… and smart. She was so smart. She'd even saved up to go to college… And, she was so in love. She was happy, and full of _so much promise_.

But on what was supposed to be her wedding day, we buried her.

The light was completely gone out of Emmett's eyes after that. It'd been the last straw for him it seemed. Beth had represented hope of getting out of here… Being something more…

When she died it was a suffocating reminder that this was all we'd ever be.

"My reputation precedes me." Emmett was pleased.

"It _exceeds_ you, boy." The man standing over Emmett was tired, blood pouring out of his nose and his bruises were already red on his sweaty skin.

He looked awful.

Emmett may have been knocked down, but he was far from out as he pushed to his hands and knees still choking on his bloody laughter in amusement.

Emmett struggled to his feet, a wide humorless grin on his battered face. Blood flowed out of his mouth in a terrible stream, rushing down the front of his chin and down his chest.

The man exhaled, dreading the fact that Emmett didn't quit.

"And you're shorter than I expected." Em gave him a cocky shrug, standing a head taller than him.

"You, stupid, arrogant boy." The other man growled. "The only reason you aren't as dead as your good for nothin' trash family is 'cause God doesn't have any use for you."

Emmett's eyes shifted then into something unimaginably dark…

I could see in his face he genuinely believed in their berating, letting the words resonate in his ego.

I saw in his eyes…

_Emmett wanted to die._

It broke my heart to acknowledge, but there was a darkness in him now that hadn't been there before.

He was heavy with hopelessness.

The other man reared back to strike him in what he hoped would be the final blow.

I prepared for the worst, wincing and closing my eyes, but when I opened them it was the other man flat on his back - not Emmett.

Emmett was on top of him then, striking him with punches to the face again and again and again.

I couldn't look away.

Something about it was magnetic.

No one acted on impulses the way Emmett did. There was a filter between most people's emotions and their physical expressions of them, but with Emmett…

There was no filter with him.

I'd never seen such raw, untamed hatred in my life.

"McCarty!" One of the fight leaders yelled at him after a chaotic moment.

It vibrated in my soul.

Emmett was far from his eyes, and even as awful as it was, I couldn't look away.

"Stop it!" Another leader yelled.

"You're going to kill him!" Another.

"Emmett! Get the hell off!"

Onlookers began to scream then, and some people to moderate and diffuse the situation jumped the fence and latched on to Emmett. They pulled him, kicking and screaming off of the other man, whose face was beaten to an unrecognizable pulp.

He was unconscious.

I felt sick.

"I'm… not… finished!" Emmett shrieked angrily, pure hatred roughening his voice as fighting brought out a side of him not easily re-tamed.

Like a wild animal, Emmett panted, fighting ruthlessly to get back to his unfinished business, thirst in his bones for destruction.

"Stop it! Damn kid, calm down." One of the leaders slapped him on the cheek, back to reality while he was being held back. "You're done."

Emmett clenched his blood dripping teeth, an awful growl wracking through his body.

I shivered.

"Listen! You're finished." The apparent leader of this fight club ordered him strongly as Emmett hungered for more suffering.

But finally, they let him go, trusting him not to lunge again.

I couldn't do this.

Sam put his hand on my shoulder briefly, just brushing by since we were in public.

I thought I sensed fear in him and it made me panic.

I tried not to stare too long, but I searched his face.

Sam looked away from me.

I was terrified.

"Maybe this isn't a good idea. Not right now." Sam mumbled as if he wasn't even talking to me, but I knew he was.

I heard intimidation in his voice after seeing Emmett all but rip a person limb from limb. We both knew what Emmett was capable of, we just never would imagine being on the receiving end of it.

Now, I wasn't so sure…

The club owner looked deep into Emmett's eyes then, putting his hand behind his neck to pull his head down so he could whisper something in Emmett's good ear.

Emmett clenched his jaw and retreated then, but smiled back at him humorlessly. The owner then started counting bills while someone else was trying to pick up the destroyed man from the muddy ground.

I hated these transactions, knowing what Emmett had to do to get that money, knowing what parts of himself he was destroying.

But, the money…

"Emmett!" I called to him, starting to weave my way through the crowd. "Emmett!"

I desperately pursued him, until I was on the edge of the area.

"Ladies aren't allowed up here." A man looked me up and down. "Neither are your kind, boy."

"I'm escorting her safely on behalf of her father, sir." Sam responded, keeping his eyes down.

"Then you can stay back there with the others." The man challenged, his breath foul with alcohol as he stood up trying to press us.

Emmett noticed us then, shoving the man back with enough power to intimidate him from pursuing the matter further.

"You got somethin' to say?" Emmett snarled, grabbing onto the man's shirt collar.

The man let up, though of course, under the man's breath Emmett got called a name he'd been called ever since he'd walked Bonnie Sanders home from school. He was used to it.

It still stung in my ears though, and it absolutely ripped my soul apart for Sam.

I loved him, and I hated how difficult it was…

It seemed to only get more difficult.

"Did he touch you?" Emmett asked, his eyes immediately darting over me to make sure I wasn't hurt.

I shook my head, loving him with every corner of my heart.

"What are you doing here?" Emmett asked, blood still staining his teeth, but his eyes lightening at the sight of us.

He came back into them… Partly.

"We came for you." I breathed, offering Emmett the canteen of water.

One of the leaders of this hell pit offered him a flask and Emmett took that instead, wincing in pain at the alcohol's burn against the gashes in his mouth.

Emmett already smelled like alcohol, and drunkenness clouded his irises.

I worried.

"Are you okay?" I asked him quietly.

"If you think I look bad, you should see the other guy." He joked with a smile that showed his dimples.

It reminded me of who he was under all this, but I knew he was using humor to deflect.

Trauma filled his eyes.

"We did." Sam joked back lightly.

"Oh, well, shit." Emmett laughed, then gasped at the pain in his ribs, coughing a little strangled cough.

He'd broken a rib.

Again.

One of these days he was going to puncture a lung.

I never didn't worry about him.

"Em, let's go home." I tried to convince him.

"I'm not goin home." He said, his eyes dancing to a red head in the corner, heavily rouged and dressed scandalously.

Her eyes were already drinking him in and she sultrily bit her lip.

"That'd break Dolly's heart." I said, thinking he'd care about that.

His eyes darted over to me.

"She won't know unless _you_ tell her." Emmett raised an eyebrow in challenge, proving me wrong. "So she won't be hurt."

I clenched my jaw.

"Then it'll break mine." I told him strongly, looking up to his eyes and meeting his challenge. "Come home with me, just for tonight."

He was still a little boy that jumped under sheets when he couldn't face what was outside. Now, he was doing something more than just hiding in those sheets, but the metaphoric principle remained.

I saw through his fascination with women.

I raised an eyebrow.

"Dorothy…" He protested, but I still knew he'd choose me every time.

"Please." I looked into his eyes, pleading with him.

"Fine." He mumbled.

He clenched his jaw, openly listening now.

"I really have to talk to you about something." I breathed. "It's important."

"_We_ have to talk to you about something." Sam abridged, standing by me.

Emmett's eyes darted between us and underneath those bruises and gashes, I saw he was puzzled and vulnerable.

"All right." He groaned exasperatedly.

"Just gimme a second," Emmett nodded, grabbing his jacket from another girl in the front and giving her a kiss that made me have to look away.

She grabbed onto his arm, starting to whisper something in his ear. She didn't know he was deaf in that ear.

She didn't know him…

She didn't know him at all…

He didn't care. He just smiled like he heard her.

I narrowed my eyes.

I recognized her, and my stomach knotted.

Emmett was so careless…

"She's got _a family_, Emmett. A _husband_." I scolded him lightly, not even able to look at him.

"I know." He responded easily.

I crossed my arms over my chest.

He was going to get himself in trouble one of these days…

Well…

"If you came here to scold me, save it." Emmett lashed out, but not in his entirety, just a little snap. "I know it's easy to look down on me from how high your horse is."

I could handle it.

"I just don't want you to make any trouble, Em." I tried to explain.

But, he really didn't make trouble. He _was_ trouble.

"I'm just tryna make my way in the world, Dorothy." He shrugged. "Have a little fun in this misery."

"You could get outta here, you know?" I suggested, a pit in my stomach.

"Where would I go?" Emmett shrugged.

"Somewhere…" I muttered.

He wouldn't get out of here… Ever…

That crushing reality seemed to weigh heavily on him more and more every day.

He was under the impression he was stuck…

He was going to die here…

"I'm sorry, Emmett." I breathed, and Sam took my hand in the impossible darkness since no one could see us.

I squeezed Sam's fingers tight and felt more confident.

"Me too." Emmett responded sweetly, melted instantly by my apology. "Now, what is it?"

"We need to be somewhere private." I told him, nervousness a heavy burden on my chest.

I couldn't put it off any longer.

"What's more private than the middle of nowhere, Dotty?" He snickered, again forgetting the pain at his ribs.

"You might want to be sitting down." Sam mumbled.

"What?!" Emmett panicked, sensing our reticence. "What's going on?"

We'd gotten so comfortable talking about death that I didn't even imagine that Emmett was worried about me telling him another one of our family members died.

"Shhh… Shhh listen." I mumbled, taking his hand to turn off the path into the old Frasier pasture. I made a decision to try their old barn as a shelter from the cold and the outside world. No one'd been living there for at least a decade.

"You're scaring me." Emmett mumbled. "Sam? Tell me."

Sam avoided his eyes.

"Em, you got some matches?" I asked, once we climbed into the barn.

"Do I got matches?" He snorted in jest, producing some. He was a chain smoker. Of course he had matches.

"Hang on." He lit the end of his cigarette first, before I lit an old lantern in the corner, illuminating our space.

Priorities.

Rats ran out of our way as Emmett sat down on a hay bale in the corner and Sam and I stood in front of him presentationally.

"Well?" Emmett raised an eyebrow, blowing his question into a cloud of smoke.

"Can I bum a cigarette off you?" I asked him and he rolled his eyes as he gave me one, lighting the end of it.

I needed it for my nerves.

I looked over at Sam, whose eyes were wide, but willed calmness into me.

He centered me in so many ways.

"Emmett… I…" I swallowed, then took a long drag.

"We need your help." Sam admitted, keeping his eyes down. "We wouldn't ask if we weren't desperate, but… but we are…"

Emmett softened, leaning forward to put his elbows on his knees.

He looked over at me in devotion.

"Anything." Emmett nodded.

I swallowed nervously, looking over at Sam again.

I squeezed his hand then went over to Emmett, sitting in front of him on my knees and taking his broken hands in mine.

Our hands vibrated in one another's so we couldn't tell which one of us was trembling.

We both were.

I looked down at Emmett's knuckles that were beaten and bloody, then back into his broken face.

Dark circles under both his eyes seemed to deepen as the blood collected under the bright red bruise along his cheek bone.

We took a deep breath in unison, his air filling my lungs in preparation for what I was going to have to tell him.

"What is it?" Emmett whispered to just me, his eyes darting over my face.

I longed for the light that used to be in them, and I hated desperately that I was going to hurt him again…

"Em… I…." I started, my voice shaking with uncertainty.

"It's okay." Emmett didn't know what I was going to tell him, yet he swore his allegiance to me and traced his fingers across my face, full of love as he cradled my cheek.

He wiped the tears that were streaming down my face, concern painting his eyes.

"Dorothy…" He whispered, urging me on.

"We didn't… mean for this to happen." Sam started, but Emmett kept his eyes locked on me.

"Emmett, I'm…" I could barely say the words out loud.

"The most… wonderful thing has happened." I breathed. "But… I… need help… and… I…"

Emmett was growing confused, sensing my anxiety.

"I obviously didn't plan… on… But, we…"

"Dorothy." He urged me on calmly, but I thought I saw it start to register on his face.

"I'm pregnant."

He swallowed, sitting back, shock evident in his face as he ripped his hands out of mine.

I saw nothing but blank processing in his face before he stood to his feet, taking a long drag on his cigarette. He paced, his eyes wide and down at his feet. It was silent for a long time which was never the case around Emmett.

"Say something." I begged in a breath.

Sam put his hand on my shoulder and helped me up from the ground. It relaxed me, even for a fraction of a second.

Emmett stood with his back to us, obviously not wanting me to see his face. I worried, my heart in my throat and pounding relentlessly.

Emmett looked to the sky, closing his eyes.

I worried he was angry with me… or worse, disappointed in me.

Immediately, for the first time since I knew for sure…

I started to cry, and I cried _hard_.

I sobbed, feeling awful shame as my body betrayed me, but I was also crying because I'd never loved something so much, this little bean in my belly and I hadn't even met them.

It was an odd collection of emotions that sloshed around in my center like I was full on liquid.

"Tell me what you need me to do." Emmett finally said, his voice strong and even, but he didn't turn around to look at me.

Sam put his arm around me, trying to comfort me.

It helped a little as I caught my breath.

"Em, I…" I choked out, not knowing what to say.

"Dorothy…" Sam said, stroking my face in comfort of my irrational release of emotions.

"I don't know what to do…" I tried again, but still couldn't form coherent thoughts.

"Goddammit Dorothy…" Emmett pinched the bridge of his nose, and closed his eyes.

"Goddammit what?" I asked, hating my shaking voice.

"How could you be so stupid?…" He groaned.

Immediately, anger bubbled within me and I shook out of Sam's arm to step forward to Emmett in challenge.

"The only reason you think _I'm_ stupid is because _you_ can't get pregnant." I lashed out. "You've been fucking around with God knows who and…"

"Oh save it." Emmett snapped, but he knew I had a point and wouldn't admit it.

"Don't you _understand _what this means?!" Emmett's voice rose to my level, still not looking at me and it made me so angry I could spit. "Dorothy, this is… Oh my God."

Both his hands came to the sides of his head like he couldn't begin to process.

"I understand what it means, Emmett." I said strongly.

"I don't think you do." He argued.

"And Sam, I could kick your ass." Emmett groaned.

"Emmett… I…" Sam began, and protectively, I worried.

"Stop." Emmett tried to silence him. "Dorothy, I'm sorry. I just… God, I… _I love you_ and, I don't want anything to ever hurt you and…"

I love you was not something he ever said and I knew how hard it was for him to admit so it took my breath clean out of my chest.

We all seemed to take a deep breath in unison to center ourselves then.

"If you need it… taken care of, I know somebody…" Emmett said in a dark, serious tone obviously not sure how to talk about this.

I wasn't shocked he knew an abortionist, but it made my heart sink to the soles of my shoes.

I irrationally wondered if he'd ever needed one.

"_Not_ 'cause I needed to." He answered my prying twin questions. "But…"

"No… I wanna have the baby, Em." I breathed, and Sam grabbed my hand. "We wanna do this."

Emmett put his hands over his face then, and I half expected him to tell me that was irresponsible and stupid.

Maybe it was…

"Then you have to get out of here. Far. _Far_ away." Emmett finally turned around, determination in his eyes to fix things.

He'd always been so good at fixing things…

His eyes still avoided mine, but I nodded.

"We know." Sam exhaled, and tightened his arm around my shoulders.

"Europe or something." Emmett entertained the thought in his mind, still ultimately detached.

Sam nodded and I realized I was still crying as tears dripped off my face.

I needed Emmett to tell me he wasn't disappointed in me.

I needed Emmett to tell me I could do this.

"You need money." Emmett rationalized in a moment of clarity as if his processing was starting to kick in.

He started cleaning out his pockets and handing all the contents to Sam.

We'd both seen what Emmett had to do to get that money. It was blood money, and it seemed to weight the both of us down as Sam put it in his pocket.

"But Em…" I began to protest.

"It's not like I'm ever going to actually get out of here, Dorothy." Emmett's eyes finally met mine, a melancholy sadness to them. "And you can. You can get the chance… to really be happy."

The words did more than enough to heal my soul as I looked at him with love. He gave me a little smile that touched the dimples on his cheeks.

"You can be happy." He repeated.

"I am happy." I finally returned his smile, collecting myself as his eyes met mine.

He took a deep breath.

"Then I'm happy." Emmett said sincerely.

He offered his hand to me and I took it as he brought me in to his chest, kissing my forehead.

I closed my eyes, melting into him and exhaling the weight.

"Emmett… I'm… I'm so sorry." Sam said, his voice heavy and deep as he fought for Emmett's gaze.

As their eyes locked, more was communicated than I could comprehend.

"No. But, you _will_ be sorry if you don't take care of my sister. She's still my girl, Sam, and so help me God, if you hurt her…" Emmett turned and stepped back, speaking with fire in his voice.

"I won't. Em, I love her." Sam said just as strongly and it made my heart flutter in my chest.

"I know." He nodded. "I know…"

* * *

_Present_

I sat up straight, ironing out the kinks in my neck and the aches in my spine. I'd lost track of time at the library, bent over old newspapers…

My head spun with crossing information, thinking I must be crazy imagining all of these fanciful notions of Rosalie Hale…

Then… I saw her picture on the front page of a missing person's report and my soul seemed to leave my body.

Chills ran down my spine and raised the hair on my arms in a ghostly awfulness staring into her eyes… Vivien's eyes… were so different.

It took the breath clean out of my chest.

Then, I pushed on.

I had to know.

I drank in the words thirstily, hating each one of them.

The words… suicide… crazy… jealousy… tragedy… a waste… tumbled over the pages and confused me.

They found a body… Identified a body…

I flipped through pages upon pages… searching…

Rosalie Hale was dead.

I sat back, taking a deep breath.

No.

I was looking at the wrong information…

The wrong puzzle pieces…

I dug and dug and dug, finding myself running in circles and frustrated. I imagined this would bring me more clarity, but it was just confusing me even more.

It'd been a month already and I hadn't gotten a letter back from Rosalie Hale. I wrote her every couple of days and I worried every moment that she'd never respond, that I'd never get the answers I so desperately was seeking.

My heart couldn't handle the rejection. I couldn't handle the not knowing…

I felt Emmett's life force in my very essence and I had to know if I was right.

I had to know… But what would help me figure this out?…

My eyes glassed over, dancing in and out of the details of the stories of May 1933. All mention of Rosalie Hale had died out almost abruptly, and the search for a young girl from outside of town became a little more than a disturbing footnote as I recognized the resemblance to Rosalie. She was far from as beautiful, but she had the same golden hair and statuesque figure… I recognized a name in the engagement announcement section, then that shook my trance… _Royce King_…

I zeroed in on this information seeing he'd gotten engaged again just a month after Rosalie's death, and then in June at the Plaza in New York City, he was married to Florence Huntingdon, an heiress from Georgia that'd just been visiting town…

They were the kind of beautiful couple you'd only see in the movies or in paintings hung in museums. She had long blonde hair, curled perfectly around her heart shaped face. Her eyes were kind and light, and her features were dainty and sweet on her porcelain skin.

Florence was stunning…

But, it was quite peculiar that Royce was just as beautiful.

However, in examining his eyes I saw something in them that made me shiver, and something sinister seemed to brew around him.

It was quite unexplainable. I mean, he was… _perfect_. But still, I was full of unease.

I decided to check then…

I eventually found the report on his death two years later, this past summer…

My stomach was sickened then, entertaining the the atrocity of his death. The omission of details seemed to make it even worse, and my imagination ran wild.

I took a deep breath.

And just as Vera had said, there'd been a wedding dress left at the scene.

Rosalie Hale's name came up a few times in the next few weeks in the gossip column, connecting her to his death, and for the first time connecting the deaths of the other sons of rich men to one another.

There was wild speculation, but nothing like what I'd created in my mind.

I went back into the reports of their deaths, each filled with the allusion to gruesome details that were too explicit for the newspaper…

Nothing was remotely confirmed for me, all my suspicions… And all of this information just seemed to make my head spin even more.

I frustratedly hung my head into my hands with a groan.

What piece was I missing that could connect her to Emmett… to Tennessee… to anything…

What missing piece confirmed what Royce King and his friends did to Rosalie Hale?

What information sewed this story together with Vivien's?

I wracked my brain for details trying to sift between truths and lies that Vivien told me…

Then, something in me decided to check police reports to see if Royce King or his friends had left any patterns of violence behind them.

I finally stood from my spot, collecting the newspapers and filing them back accordingly. My passion for truth-seeking was starting to show in my unrest, and Vera was beginning to worry about the secrets I kept.

It was my day off now, and she was busy enough with her own depression though that she became ultimately distracted from what I was up to, but she did encourage me to apply to college…

I had never imagined even going to college, but Vera told me something about journalism…

It was a good enough excuse to use as a front to why I spent so much time in the library and looking through newspapers though, so I did… I applied…

And a part of my heart knew I was doing it for my sister Beth as much as I did it for myself.

Archives had become a familiar home to me, but the second I showed up at the police station and asked for records, I was laughed away by all the men there.

I frowned, insisting on access to police reports of rape in April of 1933.

The officer at the counter rolled his eyes, insisting I was troubling my pretty head too much.

I told him I was a journalist then… My voice was shaky and unsure, but this seemed to claim a little power as one of the other officers looked up and sighed.

"They're letting women in the news room?" One of the men remarked to another.

I stood taller, trying to look confident.

Eventually, and wordlessly he slapped a small file folder down on the table in front of me.

I read through the 2 reports but none were of Royce's description and none were connected to anyone that could've been Rosalie Hale.

I exhaled, feeling defeated once again, then a thought came to my brain that seemed enough to follow.

"Do you mind sharing with me any crimes reported in April of 1933 regarding violence to women, domestic abuse, or stalking?" I asked, feeling more confident now.

The men took a deep breath, but they didn't intimidate me any longer.

"Knock yourself out." He mumbled, putting a stack of papers up to my eyes in front of me.

I sat in the corner, sifting through them all, waiting for something to stick. But really, it was all just making me sick to my stomach.

Eventually though something seemed interesting. A young woman reported being stalked by a man with light hair and light eyes…

A week later… She was dead.

The missing girl… from outside of town. It was cross listed as a case in the next town over's jurisdiction and ultimately it was fuzzy on who was supposed to take care of it, so no one helped her…

The girl who could've passed as Rosalie Hale if Royce King had needed a body…

I dropped the paper into my lap, taking a deep breath.

I was being ridiculous.

"Looks like you found what you needed." One of the men remarked.

I just shook my head, feeling like a ghost was watching me so I turned over my shoulder but nothing was there but a whisper.

I shivered.

"I'm just more squeamish than I'd thought." I dismissed, loving that I could use feminine delicacy as a distraction. "Thank you for your time."

"Sure thing, doll." The man winked, and I could barely stomach it.

I just gave him a little smile in case I needed another look at some files one day, and turned on my heel.

I knew exactly where I was going next.

I picked up a pie from an old lady down the street that owed me a favor, then I went on…

My feet hit the pavement with purpose as I soldiered on to the biggest house in Rochester. It was towering, like a foreboding, cursed castle…

It took my breath.

I smoothed my dress and pinched my cheeks to look presentable as I knocked on the door.

I remembered then how my mother would talk to women in town that had more money than we did and tried to absorb the behaviors before the door opened.

Of course, she wouldn't answer the door. One of her servants would.

"Yes ma'am?" The woman at the door said.

She had kind, dark eyes and a pleasant, round face.

"I'm looking to call on Mrs. Florence Huntingdon King?" I began, offering up the pie as some sort of gesture of good faith.

"Who is it, Sue?" A woman's voice like nothing I'd ever heard seemed to breeze past my ears like a light summer wind, twirling aerodynamically through the air with grace.

Her photograph didn't do her justice. Around the corner came an angel of myth, with long strawberry blonde hair, curled like a waterfall down her back. She was dainty like a ballerina and she floated on her feet as she entered the room with a fair haired little boy of around two holding onto her skirt.

He was his father's son.

A spitting image…

I was momentarily enchanted by Florence's emerald green eyes and perfect rosy lips.

"I'm new to town and I wanted to introduce myself properly. I'm Rosalie." I omitted my last name.

Florence clenched her perfect heart-shaped jaw, seeming to wince at the name. It wasn't common enough not to remind her of the one and only Rosalie Hale.

I was curious.

"Take the pie to the kitchen, Sue." Florence said without even looking in her servant's or her child's direction. "And have Linda give the baby a bath."

She kept her gaze hard on me.

"I brought you and your family a blueberry pie." I smiled pleasantly, feeling irrationally nervous as Florence's emerald green eyes darted over my face. "Best in the county."

"Your accent." Florence noticed familiarly, but still removedly.

"Alabama." I omitted the full truth. "And you've got one of your own."

"I grew up in Atlanta." Florence told me plainly, and I hoped this commonality was warming her up to me. "I miss the warmth of a familiar Southern drawl."

This brought a light smile to her perfect mouth.

It was working.

"Me too." I returned her pleasantry.

"Do you drink?" She asked me very bluntly, which sounded odd in her voice.

Her voice was almost like a child's, breathy and high pitched but in a way that tickled my ears.

"I…"

Before I responded though, she'd already turned on her toes like a ballerina.

I followed the light click of her heels into a sitting room out of a magazine.

It was immaculately decorated and incredibly fashionable.

A painted portrait of her hung over a fire place with a low burning fire crackling inside.

She was the lady of this house.

"Tell me about yourself, Rosalie." My name seemed heavy on her mouth, and I might have just imagined the pained way she swallowed afterward.

Florence began a ritual of making a gin martini then, misting the lemon on the edges in a way that resembled art.

I watched her perfect, porcelain hands.

"Oh, there's not much to tell, I just moved here to visit some family, after I applied to college."

"You're a college girl?" She said this with a sort of impressed air to her breathy voice.

"Still hoping to be." I gave her a smile as she handed me a martini glass.

It was almost alarming how easy it was to sit down and talk with her, but her essence made it natural. I just wondered why _she_ was so open to _me_.

Maybe the name Rosalie really did just carry a magic ticket around here.

"I was visiting family before I was going to start college at Vassar when I met my husband…" Florence smiled bitterly, and I recalled he'd been killed just a few months ago…

It wasn't another lifetime for her like it was for me.

"I never got to go to my first class." Florence finished making her own drink. "Cheers."

I tilted my glass up as she sat down next to me, her posture absolutely balletic.

"What are you hoping to study?"

"Journalism I think." I suggested.

"A woman in a newsroom." Florence smiled as if this rebellious thought pleased her.

"I suppose things are really advancing for our gender these days." I offered, taking a sip of the martini.

My insides tingled at the taste of alcohol.

Florence sighed, her beautiful eyes looking at me as if she was trying to find something.

"Something like that." Florence seemed amused with me.

I sensed a melancholy loneliness in her eyes, and she had the faintest of dark circles on the pale translucent skin around her eyes that suggested she hadn't been sleeping well.

I wondered if she'd ever been without a man in her life to take care of her.

First her father, then her husband…

I hated myself for thinking something so rude about her, especially as I continued to get to know her.

She was truly… a gem. A rare gem…

There was something… something in her no one else I'd ever known had ever possessed.

But, after some time, she shook me out of my entrancement and reminded me what I'd come here for.

"It's nice to actually talk with someone again." Florence said, sighing with a bittersweet happiness as she looked over at me, then did something I didn't expect.

She reached to take my hand.

There was a desperate pain in her eyes.

"It has certainly been a pleasure meeting you-" I said, but she cut me off.

"No, and… the person I was before all this… I would have apologized for being so vulgar and blunt, but I'm _not _sorry. I'm going to tell you what I think. Most people in this town don't step within a hundred feet of me anymore, thinking I'm cursed or something, or… They pity me so much they don't know what to say…" Florence exhaled, finishing her second martini just as she stood to prepare another.

My skin burned under my gloves from where she'd put her gloved fingers on top of mine.

She was so strange…

Her husband wasn't coming home, but her eyes darted to the door regardless, almost glassy as she imagined.

"I was recently widowed…" She said, as if it were easier to say with her back to me. "If you've been in this town for five minutes, I'm sure you already know that."

I'd been caught.

I just nodded lightly, but she didn't acknowledge it. She didn't turn around

"Everyone brought pies in the beginning." Florence said. "Then, when they stopped coming, so did everyone else. I'm a pariah in this town."

"No…" I started to protest.

"It's true." Florence insisted, turning around now, a power to her baby voice that hadn't been there before. "Even before all this…"

It made me curious.

"Would you like another drink?" Florence offered, her eyes strong and piercing.

"Oh no th-"

"I insist." Florence said strongly, something about her gaze on me making me shiver so I nodded and took the glass, though I wasn't even done with my last one.

It was like she saw through me…

"I'm sorry." I told her, hoping she felt that in this I was sincere.

She just shrugged.

"What about you, Rosalie? Have you a husband?"

"Oh, no I don't have a husband." I blushed wildly.

"Someone's got your heart though. You're blushing." Florence insisted, bringing her lips to her glass as she sat forward, seeming interested in gossiping.

"He died a long time ago." I don't know why I admitted this to her, and I bit my tongue after the words tumbled out.

"Oh, dear, I'm sorry." Florence said sincerely, her eyes melting onto me like hot candle wax.

I saw her start to feel a deep kinship with me, and in an odd way I felt a kinship with her too.

Death connected people in very odd ways…

I took a deep breath, gaining the confidence to start my questions.

"If you don't mind me asking…" I lead in, hoping this wouldn't trigger a negative chain reaction.

Looking into her eyes though I saw what I imagined was in my eyes months ago - a dull _denial._

"I don't mind, but I also don't know what to tell you…" Florence said evenly. "No one knows what really happened to my husband."

"Oh, that's dreadful." I said, playing into it.

"Mmhm." Florence responded over her glass.

I sensed her drunkenness and I was encouraging it… I felt awful as I watched her descend.

"So was he sick for a long while, and doctors just weren't able to?…" I hated myself.

"He wasn't sick. He was murdered." Florence cut me off, narrowing her eyes like she couldn't believe I didn't know that.

"Oh… I…."

"Don't worry… Rochester's perfectly safe." Florence slurred her words a bit, but her thoughts were clear. "Everyone thought it was for his money anyway. They eventually pinned it on the Mafia, and I suppose that's what makes the most sense. My brother was killed too… Back in Georgia… And the details were similar… It had to be the Mafia and some sort of money deals these men do…"

Florence seemed to be talking herself into it.

"Royce knew he was going to die." Florence whispered.

This made my heart race. I waited for her to reveal something important.

"He took out a five million dollar life insurance policy the week before he died." Florence said, trailing her fingers across the rim of the glass before taking another drink. "No one got much money… They stole just a few tens of thousands from the safe that day. Nothing substantial."

She liked her martinis strong.

I wondered about a life like hers, one of such luxury.

Maybe that's why I was doing this to her.

I resented her…

I clenched my jaw.

I almost choked on my own drink, unable to even imagine that much money.

"It takes care of me… and our son." Florence admitted. "But… But, it's not… it's not him."

I could see she genuinely loved him.

I couldn't do this.

I shouldn't have done this…

I was wrong to come here.

I took swift, shallow breaths, trying to lengthen and deepen them to calm myself.

"You loved him?" I prodded, wondering if she'd reveal anything about his true character.

That's what I was looking for. I had hoped she would tell me he was a monster, but… but it was the opposite.

He was far from it in her eyes.

He'd been an immortalized saint to her.

"Of course I loved him. He was my husband. The father of my child…" Florence wiped her tear off her cheek.

Shit shit shit shit shit

I had a pit in my stomach. Why did I have to be so cruel?

"I'd give every cent back to have him walk through that door." Florence nodded to the front door with wistfulness and started to cry even harder, finishing her drink now.

God… I hated that I'd hoped she would've told me he was abusive. It would make the story make sense…

But now, it seemed like Rosalie Hale… Vivien… had lied to me.

Maybe she really was overcome with jealousy… Maybe she'd killed him because he married and it wasn't her…

I didn't know what any of the truth was anymore.

My mind was a tangle and I tried to get back to the present.

"Let's have some of that pie." I tried to encourage Florence, reaching to wipe some of her tears for her with my handkerchief embroidered with a rose that Vivien had left in the pocket of the dress she'd switched with mine… I imagined the rose was for Rosalie…

She cried, and I kept my hand on her shoulder in support for her as she sobbed.

I hated myself that I still wanted more answers and needed her to calm down so I could get them.

Who was I becoming?

She nodded though, and as she reached for a bell to ring for her servants, she stopped herself.

"Follow me." She whispered as I trailed behind, my stomach tight and nervous.

She pushed into a kitchen she didn't cook in, noticing the pie on a cake stand in the center of the room.

After trying a few drawers, she found where they kept her silverware and produced two forks.

"I can grab the plates." I suggested, but she had already taken the pie off of the stand and stuck her fork straight into it.

For someone so proper, she was so undone…

It was exceptionally odd to see her take a mouthful of pie straight from the dish without serving herself.

"You weren't kidding." She sighed with her mouth full, lost in the decadence of the food as she took another bite. "Best pie I've had in a while."

It was so odd.

_She_ was so odd.

"I'm glad." I gave her a little smile, before she offered the dish to me.

I took a small bite, but she didn't protest, taking it back so she could take another bite.

She kicked off her shoes and sat straight down in the middle of the floor, her back against the counter.

"I can…"

"No. Sit with me." She insisted, reaching her hand up for mine.

"Rosalie." She said my name like she masochistically wanted to say it.

I slowly descended to sit next to her, feeling strange as she pulled me down by my wrist.

"No one ever wants to sit with me anymore." Florence's voice was full of loneliness and pain.

"They never wanted to sit with me." She sighed, filling her mouth with another bite of pie.

"What do you mean?…" I pushed.

"I didn't know about her… When I met him… I didn't know…" Florence said, and her voice was breathier and softer than usual.

Bingo.

"Who?" I pretended to puzzle.

I hated myself for the pain I saw in her eyes then, knowing good and well that I had caused it.

"_Rosalie Hale_…" She said her name with reverence, like it was something holy and untouchable.

Something distant.

I had to make it look like she had to explain herself.

"Royce was engaged before me. And God… She might as well have been a saint. I didn't know Royce and I had gotten engaged just a _month_ after her death… I didn't know people were saying_ I _was the reason Rosalie had killed herself, that _I_ was the other woman this whole time… I didn't know they'd all made me some kind of villain. I had so many friends in Georgia and my life was perfect and…" Florence stuffed her mouth with pie again. "My brother John had introduced me to him and…"

"I just… I _loved_ Royce." Florence cried. "But, _everybody_ _but me_ seemed to know he didn't love _me_."

Here it was.

I hated the pain she was in and the drunkenness I'd encouraged her into, but here it was.

"When I got up the courage to ask him about Rosalie, he got _so_ mad at me." Florence darkly chuckled. "I'd never seen him angry before. He was… so cool."

I remembered that was exactly how Vera had described him…

"But then, when he trusted me, he described her as… as a ghost. A _beautiful_ ghost, that you could never quite reach." Florence exhaled, keeping her eyes down.

"Try competing with that." She hiccuped with a little giggle. "A fucking enigma…"

Something about this side of her was magnetizing, but so destructive and awful.

"He talked about her in his sleep… Said her name…" Florence whispered. "_Your_ name."

She pointed the fork into my face and my stomach dropped knowing she was drunkenly connecting me to this Rosalie Hale…

"Right before he died, he barely slept, but when he did…" Florence took another bite. "He called to her…"

"What do you mean?" I frowned.

"Exactly what I said." Florence nodded. "He practically went _mad_ with her in his head. He talked about her coming back… Even awake, he _told_ me she was coming back… I thought he was insane… He'd talk to her like she was in the room, ask her to go away, to stop watching him, to stay away from _me_… from the baby…"

I shivered, the ghost story seeming more and more real.

"Once, I told him my diamond earrings were missing… I think I actually just left them out on the sink and dropped them down the drain… It's possible, but I… I don't know. But… He ran through the house yelling at Rosalie to give them back and to leave me alone. It was like she was… _here_. He punched through a wall, in a one sided screaming match with her… It terrified me."

I could throw up.

"But nothing compared to the day he walked in and saw bouquets of roses and violets all over our house… Every room was filled with them. Even the nursery... I thought… I thought he'd sent them to me… I'd just found out I was pregnant again… I thought he… But, it… it was her. She'd been in my house... She'd touched my son... All those flowers... One in the bassinett... I _know_ that was her…"

I realized Florence only had _one_ child and this realization haunted me…

"What you said before… about him knowing he was going to die…" I probed, knowing I was taking advantage of her drunkenness. "Do you think?…"

"That it was her _ghost_ that killed him?" Florence rolled her eyes, like it was far fetched because it was, but it seemed like she believed it. "Oh sure. Wanted to be together forever I'm guessing. Would've been nice for them to let me and my _child_ in on that little plan."

"My son is never going to know his father." Florence sobbed into the blueberries.

"Oh Florence…" I broke then, knowing I'd gone too far, but a part of me wanted to push further…

"And I know that's why… why my baby died… She knew she'd never have a father…" Florence sobbed, binge eating this stupid pie and I couldn't do a thing to stop her heartache.

She descended into her grief now. I recognized it.

And once the dish was empty, only then did she duck her head into her hands.

I sat there, watching her cry in silence until she had no more tears to cry.

I was heartbroken and empty and I couldn't help but cry a few silent tears with her.

"It's okay." I breathed, wiping her mouth with my handkerchief in a maternal way that was mightily familiar to me.

My throat was tight.

"Now he's dead he gets to be with that damned beautiful ghost he always wanted." Florence drunkenly slurred her words.

"Fuck Rosalie Hale." Florence's heartache shifted into a terrifying anger as she grinned.

She said this word that I'd only heard men say like it was second nature.

Something in me responded to Florence's anger and the irrational belief that Rosalie had actually killed Royce…

Rosalie Hale knew what had happened to my brother.

She was withholding information from me.

Somehow she knew where Emmett was…

And she wasn't telling me _anything_…

"_She's_ the jealous, husband-stealing bitch, here." Florence irrationally went on, but in the truth of her drunken mind, she clearly believed in her heart…

Rosalie had killed her husband.

_This_ is what I'd come for.

"Fuck. Rosalie. Hale." Florence closed her eyes, tilting to tap the back of her head on the cabinet behind her then drooped her head so it was lying on my shoulder.

After a long moment, she spoke.

"I'm so… _lonely_." Florence said softly, her eyes darting over the depths of mine as we sat together.

"Me too." I agreed with her authentically and for the first time didn't have to lie in the slightest since I'd been here.

That was the most honest thing I'd said in so long that it made my chest hurt.

We sat there, just staring at each other for a long while, wallowing in our shared despair. From my perspective, we were also sharing a hatred for this girl called _Rosalie Hale_…

I stared at Florence's face, knowing she was also an unwilling participant in a supernatural game we didn't understand. We were at the will of something beyond explanation and our lives would never be the same.

Florence took a little inhale, and I felt it in the air around me.

"Will I ever stop feeling like this?" She asked, and my eyes darted down to her perfect red lips that even without lipstick were the envy of roses.

I just nodded.

"How do you know?" Florence asked.

"Because it has to get better." I told her.

Then, the most peculiar thing happened as Florence traced her fingers over my bottom lip, then braided her fingers into the back of my hair.

She looked down at my mouth then, up into my eyes back and forth for a second, testing.

My heart pounded in my chest and I was frozen unable to think clearly.

I felt her nervous, shaking breath on mine too, something making my reactions and my thoughts hazy…

Then, she touched her perfect, rosy lips to mine.

An electric current jolted through my body in a sort of shock, and I was paralyzed under her kiss.

What was happening?

I didn't understand.

She was… a girl…

I was… a _girl_… and….

My brain shut off as she parted her lips, deepening her kiss with me and braiding her hands through my hair.

She was tender, and gentle, and soft….

And she smelled _so good_…

I'd never kissed a woman before…

That's when I realized I was kissing her back. My hands twitched by my side. I didn't know where to put them.

But Florence did, and she traced her fingers down my neck.

I shivered and pulled away.

"I'm sorry." I dropped my focus and put my fingers to my lips tangibly reminding myself of my mouth and what had just happened.

But, I didn't know what had just happened.

It was desperate and sad and awful and…

Florence didn't say a word, but I felt her eyes heavy on me.

"I um…" I started to get up from the floor, but then I looked over at her.

"Do you want to stay for dinner?" Florence asked breathily and easily, like nothing, but everything had transpired.

Before I could think, I nodded.

We sat across from one another silently, and mostly we kept our eyes on our plates.

She'd gotten sick even before dinner was ready and the paleness and sheer sheen of sweat from drunkenness and regurgitation after eating an entire pie weighed on her, but it didn't make her any less beautiful and it made me feel so… odd.

I hated it.

Maybe I hated her.

But, as I went to leave as it got dark, she walked me to the front door, her eyes desperately heavy on me.

"Will you call on me again some time, Rosalie?" She asked, a vulnerable softness to her as she looked up at me. "I would… enjoy your company again. Maybe tea tomorrow?"

She nervously bit her bottom lip and my eyes lingered on her mouth.

I don't know why I did it, but I did, and I ducked my head to touch my lips to hers once more.

She pushed me away then, a panicked look in her eyes.

I felt vulnerable and exposed then, hating that I did that and hating that I was rejected and hating her and hating myself and hating…

She'd been drunk before. I'd been too upset before… It wasn't…

"I'm not…" Florence told me with a nod of finality.

I shook my head.

"Me neither." I denied fervently, knowing how much I loved Sam and how attracted to him I'd been. He was a man, and…

I turned my back, to open the door, but she grabbed my hand.

"Tea tomorrow?" She suggested, again, keeping her hand in mine.

I was so confused.

I just nodded.

She gave me a little smile.

That night I wrote to Rosalie but this time my letter was different not praising her courage or telling her about my progress and thanking her for it. I didn't swear to find out the truth and I didn't ask about Emmett.

I felt like I was baiting her.

_I know who you are and the games you've played. You've toyed with an innocent woman… A child. You're a monster. _

Two weeks later… I got a response from Rosalie Hale: a date and a location.


	25. Between Two Lungs

Quick note: Thank you endlessly for your reviews and encouragement! It makes me SO HAPPY to see your responses! Thank you for investing in me and this story! In this uncertain time, I hope this story provides you some sort of escape or comfort. I'm sending all my love to you all. ALSO, HOW EXCITING FOR A MIDNIGHT SUN RELEASE!

These next few chapters are from Rosalie's perspective and the next few chapters have taken shape as perhaps the most important parts of this entire work and why I wanted to write this in the first place. There's a definite need for discussion on healing after trauma and the secondary victims of sexual assault in particular: the partners of survivors. I have so much love and respect for the couple SMeyer gave us with Emmett and Rosalie, and I think they had to navigate through incredibly difficult things together even before contemporary social developments that began to equip us for these difficult conversations, but that are unfortunately so real for too many people.

One exchange in particular beyond when Rosalie tells Bella that Emmett is exactly the kind of person someone like her needed is actually in the few chapters Stephenie Meyer released from Midnight Sun long ago in an exchange between Emmett and Edward. Edward mentions to Emmett or thinks it, I can't remember and she's taken it down today so I can't check for the exact quote, but Edward tells Emmett Rosalie's more work than a pretty face is worth. This REALLY triggered me and while it may not have been inherently meant this way, I couldn't help but think it was in reference to her trauma because while she is much more than what happened to her, there's a lot to sift through and detach from her identity in the process of being more than her trauma. I know you guys are FULLY aware of how much I love Rosalie and Emmett, but this is sort of hit the pinnacle for me. The two of them represent a whole lot more to me than I felt was written from Bella and Edward's limited perspectives, and they truly exhibit qualities of deep understanding of their partner.

I also find it incredibly interesting to note they live apart from the rest of the Cullen family habitually, and Edward even mentions this to Bella. This was in reference to Emmett and Rosalie's sexual relationship and how the others can't stand being around them, but I believe it's interesting to imagine they had a disconnection from the others that was more deeply rooted in how they understood one another and all the private dealings they had to navigate together apart from outsiders.

\- ! I want to emphasize that in order to write Rosalie into her time period of 1935, and specifically her society life and manners, there's some reference to her beliefs on sex and physical intimacy that are incredibly warped and dated \- particularly in regards to purity culture.

After the last few chapters focused on Dorothy's loneliness and limited understanding of the supernatural dealings happening around her, and the frustration she's beginning to feel for Rosalie's cryptic nature because of these misunderstandings, I felt this chapter had to return to the core of the work, but also set things up for Emmett's loyalties to be tested in later chapters in a far more realistic and conflicting way. This is to come. ;) And to help set up a little more clearly, the exchange between Dorothy and Rosalie that is coming up after this. I wanted Rosalie to be in a vulnerable place, an emotionally exhausted, low place when she goes to meet Dorothy - a new rock bottom.

Side note: PLEASE BE STAYING HEALTHY AND TAKING CARE OF YOURSELVES!

Please pleeaaaaaase consider leaving a review! Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

TW/CW: sexual assault, ptsd, purity culture

Also just FYI, a little lemon zest in this chapter to lighten things up before they get _dark_... YOU WERE WARNED

* * *

_**Between Two Lungs**_

_And my running feet could fly_

_Each breath screaming: "We are all too young to die!"_

_Between two lungs it was released_  
_The breath that passed from you to me_  
_It flew between us as we slept_  
_That slipped from your mouth into mine_

_Gone are the days of begging_  
_The days of theft_  
_No more gasping for a breath_  
_The air has filled me head to toe_  
_And I can see the ground far below_  
_I have this breath and I hold it tight_  
_And I keep it in my chest with all my might_  
_I pray to god this breath will last_  
_As it pushes past my lips_  
_As I..._  
_Gasp_

* * *

**Rosalie**

I caressed the cello, sitting on the back terrace surrounded by flowers in their colorless winter slumber, their shriveled leaves made heavy by the falling snow. The world was dead around me, but I… I felt alive for the first time in a very long time.

There was a poetry in the air, a beauty in the stillness of winter here.

In my solitude, I could think, and I could process.

In my introverted world, I could recharge and reemerge.

I'd been drained by the emotional turmoil of my last altercation with Emmett and the absolute hell we faced when we returned.

I'd expected nothing less of course. Esme was sympathetic, Carlisle was forgiving, and Edward was bitter.

But, something was different with Emmett. Something had changed as he took his sentence of thirst and control without protest or complaint. He knew his punishment must fit his crime, or maybe he was just realizing it was pointless to resist.

Beyond that though, there was an odd calmness to him, a carefulness that hadn't been there before and I didn't know if I liked it.

Of course I remembered how vulgar I found his wildness at one point, but I… I missed it now.

After two weeks of starving, he'd been gone for days, hunting with Carlisle and training his focus. The last time we'd been alone had been a combination of my wildest dream and my deepest nightmare. I was made confident and secure in him, while also feeling more skittish and embarrassed than I'd ever been.

Since, Emmett hadn't touched me in two weeks.

Even as I tried to brush by him, he shrunk away from me. I irrationally imagined he didn't want me, though that was preposterous and I knew it. He _had_ to want me.

And, we hadn't dared to utter the words that we'd let slip the last time we'd been together.

I still meant them though…

I loved him.

But, I worried he didn't love me in his rational mind. I was positive that to me, these words hadn't slipped in an emotional high, but with him I wasn't so sure.

He smiled at me boyishly, but almost reservedly, each time we encountered one another.

I didn't understand.

But, I was mortified.

It was past embarrassment.

As relieved as I was that he didn't take me up on my offer, my vanity and feminine ego was greatly bruised.

Why didn't he make love to me?

I had _asked_ him to, yet he still refused.

It made me sick to acknowledge that he didn't seem the type of guy to refuse _any_ girl's advances, and I knew he had to have received countless propositions.

After reflection, I assumed he refused me not out of uncertainty, but out of experience…

Experience with women enough to know the look in my eyes betrayed me…

_I wasn't ready._

I didn't understand him.

Why did it _matter_ to him if I wasn't ready?

In preparation for my wedding, my mother had a conversation with me that women weren't supposed to _enjoy_ it. The function of sex was just to please the men we were with.

If this was the case, and it would please him, then why did he refuse me?

My fingers danced along the neck of my instrument in a melancholy, lonely tune.

I thought of Emmett's fingers along the lace of my underwear and my legs tingled, open around the body of the cello.

Something was wrong with me.

Esme tried to address it in her own roundabout way, but it hadn't resonated that it was perfectly acceptable for me to have desire…

While I had grown out of the shame I felt about wanting Emmett in a physical way, it had shifted into an odd feeling of curiosity and confusion.

I felt there was something essential I was missing that everyone else possessed, and it frustrated me.

It angered me that he seemed to know what he was doing, but it also comforted me and made me feel safe and taken care of.

I thought of what Esme said about intimacy being more than sex.

A thought I would barely entertain intruded my mind then.

The Denali sisters spoke of _pleasure_…

They giggled and talked about things they did in the dark that I...

I shivered.

I didn't understand, and I felt like there was something everyone else knew about sex and physical intimacy that I didn't. I felt out of the loop and positively childish. It made me fill with an irrational anger.

I was only promised it would hurt, but I didn't imagine quite the level of pain to what Royce and his friends did to me…

In a light breeze, Emmett was conjured to my senses. Tobacco and thyme.

But, it was strong enough I knew I wasn't just imagining it this time.

I was taken from my tangling dark thoughts as he wiped them away and absent-mindedly, I smiled over my dancing fingers.

I would've been embarrassed of all of my thoughts, my wonderings about pleasure….

But he gave me no room for shame now. I was excited to have him back.

"Well?" I began, coy and not turning over my shoulder to look at him.

He was close enough to touch me; I felt it.

"Tell me you missed me." He requested, but he still didn't touch me.

His velvet voice was a preemptive caress, and I felt it smoothing over my skin.

"Well, you already boldly assume this to be true, so how about _you_ _show_ me you missed _me_." I told him boldly, having mustered up courage over this stretch of time being without him.

He laughed heartily, and I was insulted, immediately thrust into the depths of my insecurity.

I clenched my jaw bitterly, but still avoided his eyes.

"Rosalie Hale…" He exhaled my name in a sort of awe.

"You're a funny girl." Then, he did touch me, his fingers light as they traced the pattern around the diamond earrings I wore, dangling down my neck.

"I don't recall telling any jokes." I teased back flirtatiously, but my voice was breathless.

Emmett picked up on it.

His fingers left a trail of fire on my skin, and I tried my best not to shiver, but it was no use.

I missed his hands on me.

It was a shiver of anticipation as I wished for more.

I didn't slow my playing, and my sad lonely lamentation shifted into something more sultry.

He responded to this shift, by ducking from where he stood behind my chair to kiss my neck, tracing his lips down the vines of my bloodless veins.

"You're in a better mood." I commented.

He chuckled against my skin.

"What are you talking about? I'm always in a good mood." He didn't understand my reference.

I took my position of power, to pull away from him ever so slightly.

I intended him to follow me, but he didn't and I cursed the risk that I took.

All the courage and power I'd mustered up was gone now with the simple touch of his lips to my skin, and I hated that I was melted and powerless against him now.

"It's been a while since you touched me." I suggested, wishing I sounded more confident.

Then, with abruptness I didn't expect, he reached around my waist and between my legs, navigating with confidence up under my skirt.

I gasped at the feeling of his fingers and the note I was playing fell flat, my knees twitching inward.

"Keep playing." He ordered me, with a new level of lowness to his voice, and I would've done anything he asked then.

He sat on the ledge behind me, his lips on my neck and his fingers…

As much as my visceral reaction was for my legs to twitch closed, they were forced open on either side of the cello and he took advantage of this position.

I swallowed, doing what I was told even though it took every bit of focus I possessed.

He dove past the barrier of my underwear with dismissive ease, and I was trembling in a combination of nervousness and desire.

His touch was soft, yet incredibly assured and I melted into him, a sound coming out of my mouth that had never come out of it before.

I sighed with pleasure, sensations in my body that I'd never felt before overwhelming my senses.

"That's my girl." He said, obviously pleased with my sound.

Just the sound of the phrase and the way he sounded so satisfied with me, left me filled with desire for him, pooling between my legs.

His free hand braided into my hair, pulling my head backward lightly so my neck was more exposed to him as he kissed down the length of it.

"Slower." He told me, and I realized I was still disconnectedly playing the cello at a swift pace that mirrored my inner desperation.

I intently tried to do what I was told, and it was one of the hardest things I'd ever done.

I closed my eyes as he traced a lazy circle into me. My body took over my mind then, and everything was visceral and instinctual.

_Pleasure_…

He knew what he was doing, and intuitively he knew how to please me.

He listened to the cues of my body that I didn't even know existed.

He translated a language I didn't even know I was speaking.

I was wrapped up in pleasure, transported all at once to a space more in tune with my physical self and a space transcending it.

The rhythm of it synced into a symphony my body played that he knew perfectly as if he had composed it himself.

"_Oh. God_." I sang.

I dropped the bow, and I couldn't stop the sound that escaped from me as something in my body felt like… like an arrow being pulled back in a bow then shot off and vibrating a resonation through the entirety of my core.

Like… like an explosion.

Like a release….

Like… heaven.

I took a deep gasping inhale and I felt him smile against my neck, but he didn't stop, letting this bright, velvet radiation taper off in my body before he pulled his hand out from under my skirt.

My legs were shaking.

I dreamily looked up at him then in a bewilderment and odd mental limbo.

I saw him for the first time in this encounter then, something about that feeling naughty and inappropriate.

_All_ of it felt inappropriate.

But, I… I wanted to do it again.

He finally kissed my lips, a victorious smile on his mouth making him taste sweet.

I was breathless, still in a state of euphoria.

"Do you believe me now?" He asked, his voice low and perfect and sultry.

I couldn't think. I had left my body.

Nothing on earth had ever felt like that before.

My legs and arms felt heavy and I felt… like I'd drunk too much champagne.

What was that?

His smug smile made his dimples deep in his cheeks.

I steadied my breath in this odd headspace I was in.

Was I floating away from my body?

It was sweltering hot.

"What?" I breathed shakily, my voice trembling in my chest.

"That I missed you." He suggested, barely kissing my lips as he hovered over them to make me shiver.

I was too distracted thinking about what sort magic his fingers knew, those divine patterns.

He was focused on my lips though, then he pulled away and smiled that same accomplished, smug smile. It was like my pleasure was his own.

I didn't understand.

I irrationally worried about his expectations, but as I examined his eyes there were none, only that _I_ was… made happy.

Then, the oddest emotional spectrum shift I'd ever experienced wracked through my body.

I was malfunctioning.

I went from a wild euphoria to desperate loneliness being disconnected from him.

I replaced the cello, to prop against the chair standing unbridled in front of him.

Whew, my legs felt wobbly, but I tossed my arms around his shoulders, ducking my head into him and taking deep inhales of his skin. I closed my eyes, shaking as I imagined him absorbing me into his own body. I never wanted him closer more than I did right now.

Even this close, I wanted him closer.

It wasn't enough.

"What is it?" He asked, in a humored concern, his hand floating up to my back.

I clutched my fingers into the fabric of his shirt, loneliness pulsing through every cell of my body like a bruise.

I wondered if this was a byproduct of the euphoria, this connection to him that I couldn't explain and had no hopes of rationally processing. I felt him like stardust against me, something mystical filling my lungs as I inhaled him.

"Come on Rose, what's going on in your head?" He asked, kissing my cheek.

I shook my head.

"I… don't know." I answered the only way I knew how.

My attachment was disintegrating my loneliness, but also intensifying it with desperation.

This pain… It was tearing me apart.

I didn't know how to express it.

Loving him hurt… so… damn… much…

I was heartsick and dizzy, but the moment he took my face in his hands and kissed me nose, I grinned with unimaginably light playfulness.

A giggle escaped my throat as I was painfully severed from my sadness.

Like I said, my emotional spectrum was malfunctioning.

I was lightheaded.

"Was that all right?" He asked, genuine concern for my reaction evident as his gaze traced over my face.

I exhaled, unable to stop myself from smiling.

"More than all right." I nodded, and he grinned, dimples deep in his cheeks.

I wish I had words to articulate the experience, but I couldn't do it.

"I want to please you." He told me dotingly, kissing my lips ever so lightly.

I almost bent under the weight of his admiration, but I drank it in thirstily wanting every last drop of it.

He snaked an arm around my waist, pulling me forward so I stood in between his open knees where he sat.

His eyes floated over my body, but not in a menacing way, in an appreciative, _reverent_ way.

It was a worshipful experience, and I reveled in it.

Then, as if he saw something in my face, he smiled wide.

"It's hard for me to believe if you don't say it out loud." He said, kissing my lips now before he pulled away, his eyes searching over my face in this perfect, awful, blissful moment.

"What?" I asked softly, my gaze also searching his.

"That look in your eyes." He said, his own eyes responding to my search as they switched from iris to iris.

"What do you see in them?" I pressed, feeling more confident as he kissed me again.

The weight of his lips miraculously made my limbs feel lighter and it was just his hands on my face that kept me from floating away into the wintery sky.

"You're in love with me." He said in a low, velvety voice that sent shivers down my spine.

"That's an awfully bold accusation." I said formally, demure as I turned my cheek.

"I've been known to be bold, darling." He said just as _in_formally and settled on kissing my neck, leaving a trail of fire down to my collarbone. "But I'm right, aren't I? Tell me."

His breath on my skin made my nerve-endings electric and I bit my lip, unable to fight a smile spreading on my lips as he looked back up at me. He feigned innocence before a celebratory smile spread on his face, revealing the dimples on his cheeks I could die for.

"Have you ever been in love?" I asked him finally gaining the courage to do so.

"No. Not like this." He said stroking my hair back and ducking his head to kiss my forehead.

I shivered at the thought that he was in love with me. He'd called _this_ being in love and I reveled in it.

"What was it like then?" I asked, closing my eyes and loving the feeling of his hands in my hair.

"It was childish." He responded shortly, kissing my lips in a way that suggested he couldn't bear not to.

"Then, who was your childhood sweetheart?" I wasn't leaving the subject.

"Edie Green." He responded without hesitation, a smile in his eyes as I looked up at him. "Mmm, what a doll."

I raised an eyebrow and he went on to playfully torture me with my irrational and frivolous jealousy over the object of his childhood regards.

"That smile… Oh, she always smiled especially big when she lost a baby tooth 'cause she was so proud of losing 'em – when she lost the two in the front – wow, now that made her look especially radiant."

He laughed in his reverie of innocence and mischievousness and I nudged his arm in pseudo-jealousy of a little girl with missing baby teeth that had won his childhood affections in so many years past.

He wrapped his arms around me, squeezing me tight as I tittered.

"What was she like? What made you sweet on her?" I also wanted to know why he was twenty years old and not promised to anyone as well as the extent of his romantic history, but this was a sidestep into these subjects.

"I was a kid, Rosalie. I have no idea." He laughed, sighing and looking like he didn't really want to talk about this and just wanted to kiss me.

"So superficially, you just liked her for her baby teeth?" I raised an eyebrow.

He found this hilarious, and I smiled at myself – never knowing myself to crack jokes like this. I surprised myself at this new layer of my personality, taking a moment to let it sink in.

"She was headstrong." He nodded, then traced his hands over my hips and down my thighs. "Like you."

I rolled my eyes.

"Headstrong? Edward usually just calls it pigheadedness." I wasn't sure now if Emmett meant that as a compliment.

"Edward doesn't see you like I do." Emmett responded swiftly. "_Thank God_."

I wrinkled my nose at the thought.

"Guess, I've just always liked strong women." Emmett kissed the end of my nose in a sweet, mindless gesture. "That intimidates some folks, but not me. No sir. It's no threat to _my_ masculinity. It's not that fragile."

I rolled my eyes. He didn't think before he spoke. It was charming most times.

"Tell me something about her." I said.

"Like what?" He seemed almost exasperated at my fixation, but remained open.

"How did you know her?"

"We grew up together." Emmett said shortly.

"I figured that much," I pressed, seeing his reticence as something suspicious because he was _never_ withholding.

That was _my_ job.

"Well that's just how you meet people in Tennessee, Rose." He laughed dismissively.

"And what about when you grew up? Any girlfriends to speak of?" I tried to sound smooth but there was no point.

I was positively desperate.

"Uh-uh, no. Not until I find out who swept _you_ off your dainty little feet as a girl." He teased and kissed my forehead.

"Hmm… Roosevelt Warner." I giggled after searching my mind for a moment, the innocence of child's play flooding the present air and mimicking the days gone by playing in my front yard with a boy from school that picked daisies for me out of Mrs. Willard's garden.

"Oh, my, sounds like one fancy cat." Emmett raised an eyebrow. "I'll bet I don't hold a candle to the gentleman!"

"He _was_ such a romantic, carving R + R in the tree behind our school." I winked. "He was actually my first kiss. I was fifteen and he asked me to the winter dance… He had blonde hair and interesting green eyes and…"

"I get the picture." Emmett teased, but I recognized that fire of jealousy in his eyes and it made me irrationally filled with desire.

It pleased me.

"But, my parents _never_ approved." I sighed at the little tragedy.

"And why is that?" Emmett played along with his fake concern.

"His mother was a flapper and his father was a writer." I recalled because I clung to human memories. "Rumor was they were communists. Quite the radical bunch."

Emmett laughed, but his focus turned to trace a finger down the center of my chest and down to my naval, over the fabric of my dress.

"And what would your parents have thought of _me_?" He lowered his chin, showering my neck and jaw with kisses in a positively suggestive way.

I attempted to collect my thoughts as he kissed me this way.

Then, he pulled back, anticipating an answer to his question though he knew and just seemed to masochistically want to hear me say it.

"They wouldn't have liked you one bit." I bit my lip in a not so innocent manner.

"Why?" He chuckled, but something told me he already knew, but was playing into the joke.

"They'd say you were beneath me." I said, climbing on top of him where he sat to illustrate my point and kiss him a little more wildly.

He pushed me away a little though, a displeased look on his face.

He knew what I was going to say yet still…

I was confused.

"Doesn't that matter to you?" He was actually seriously concerned.

"Not at all." I dismissed, trying to kiss him again, but he nudged me off his lap and I stood, shocked and disconnected in front of him.

"I just… I know didn't have the same upbringing as you. I didn't go to fancy schools and learn fancy manners, or how to read fancy books, or have a fancy afternoon drive in a fancy car." He droned on. "I can't talk to you about stuff like that because I don't know anything about it. I can't… give you that."

"It sounds like that matters to _you_, not me." I raised an eyebrow, testing.

I recalled the way his father and his sisters had looked at me, obviously knowing I was out of place, and passing judgments about me just because of the way I was dressed.

Like I had money and this meant something about me.

"No, it doesn't." He said strongly. "I just know we don't change _that _much when we turn into a vampire and I'm no _Roosevelt Warner_."

I was glad because a Roosevelt Warner could grow up to be a Royce King II.

I clenched my jaw, positively angry now.

"Emmett, if you must know…" I narrowed my eyes impatiently. "My parents were _malicious_ social climbers that used me as a tool and…. _That's_ what got me killed… And I haven't forgiven them for that. So no, it _doesn't _matter to me what the hell they would've thought of you or that we came from opposite ends of the class system in our far away human lives, but if it matters to _you_ so much..."

I said all of this in one venomously swooping breath, before I turned my back to him.

"Rosalie, stop." He reached out, grabbing onto my left arm so I couldn't walk away.

He dropped his hand and I turned to face him, crossing my arms over my chest.

"I'm sorry." He said, his hands sliding up the sides of my legs, making the fabric of my dress seem insignificant as his hands made their way to my hips, his thumb making circles on the bones.

"I was being a crumb, just talking nonsense." He looked up at me with brilliant, pleading eyes and I couldn't resist his unspoken request for me to join him again. "Forgive me, angel."

After I tortured him enough with my silence, I elegantly lowered to sit beside him, and he smiled a brilliant smile in triumph.

He kissed me, his lips tasting sweet as cinnamon. It was impossible to stay angry with him, but I didn't reveal this information to him.

"That was the first time you've talked about how you died to me." His eyes darted over my face, knowing it was significant to me.

Seriousness in his tone made me shiver and I didn't like it. I didn't like the possibility of having to tell him.

So I took a card out of his book and tried to play it off with humor.

"Now as promised, about your girlfriends?" I pried.

"Oh my God." He chuckled, but retained some of his seriousness.

He knew that was all I could say right now though and he didn't dare press for more information on my death. He knew I couldn't give it to him.

"Well, there was Edie when I was a kid if that counts…" He started, a special fondness for her evident in his eyes. "And… a few… well _some_ other girls once I got older. A girl named Dolly."

I narrowed my eyes, something significant about this girl Dolly enough that he said her name, and I couldn't help but notice he edited himself from few to _some_.

"Nothing ever really serious." He tried to dismiss again.

Again, I narrowed my eyes.

"So Edie's family lived right down the hill and around the old church. I'd always stop in front of her house and insist we walk to town together when our parents would send us on errands." Emmett explained how he grew to care for her, knowing the details would satisfy me. "I'd always steal a peach for her from the market, and we did that every week at least for a few years."

"That's sweet." I confirmed, picturing him as a gangly kid, trying to impress a pretty girl that made him blush a beautifully human shade of scarlet. "And you loved her?"

It only made me love him more, but a streak of irrational jealousy made me possessive and prying.

"I mean, I was just barely a _kid_, Rosalie. I thought she was a great girl because she wasn't afraid to pick up a frog down by the creek and she had a flashy red bicycle." Emmett shrugged, laughing humorlessly. "As a kid, I thought that was love."

"Did you ever get the guts to kiss her?" I asked, the words tasting sour coming out of my mouth when I realized I didn't want to know. "Or did she have to make the moves like I did?"

"Rosalie, that's private information!" He teased in a chuckle, lighthearted again. "And… hey, I have _plenty_ of guts! I was going for respectful gentleman with you, thank you."

I rolled my eyes as we laughed together, a moment of innocent bliss.

"I know." I appreciated that I made the first move.

"And let's not tell anyone about that. I wanna say I kissed you first." Emmett winked at me.

"I thought your masculinity could handle it?" I raised an eyebrow.

The lightness of the moment was almost too much to handle as we teased each other.

"All right Rose. I'll give you this one." He laughed, a full, world changing laugh filled to the brim with liveliness. "It's 1935, progressive ideas all over the place."

I kissed him again, unable to stay away, but also to prove my point.

"Was she beautiful?" I asked, vanity tainting my tone as I shifted back into the conversation at hand.

"Well, I certainly thought so." Emmett made a face that didn't go with his humor-filled tone. "But, when I told her that, she laughed at me."

I too laughed at the innocence, picturing the exchange perfectly.

"_Then_, she kissed me." Emmett revealed with a rascally grin.

"And you didn't marry her?" I raised an eyebrow halfway in judgment.

"No. I didn't." Emmett nodded, matter-of-factly. "I was ten. She was eight. It was hardly appropriate."

"I meant when you got old enough." I clarified with a light chuckle.

"She died a year later. I think when she died it just about killed me too." Emmett told me evenly. "I was young enough it left an impression, but old enough to be properly depressed and to properly grieve."

"I… I know it's stupid, but… But I always went on after that thinking I was cursed." Emmett told me evenly. "Everyone that was ever close to me… _died_, so I didn't really get attached to anyone in any real way. I was always afraid of losin' em."

I saw his soul then - his honest, beautiful, loving, innocent soul and I inhaled at the sight of it. I hugged to him, pressing my cheek to his chest, and swearing I could hear the beat of his frozen heart.

"I can't lose you." He told me in a way that suggested a thousand connotations.

I just nodded, for only this one instance thankful for my immortality because of the look in his eyes.

I stiffened, tightening my arms around his waist

"I'm so sorry." I swallowed, unable to imagine such atrocity in my shallow, sheltered mind.

"It was a long time ago." Emmett said, not very good at delicate conversation.

"What about Dolly?" I asked, again not wanting to know, but also wanting to know.

He clenched his jaw.

"No." This struck a chord I didn't understand.

"Why?"

"She and I wanted _very_ different things." He tried to dismiss but this annoyed me more than almost anything he'd ever said.

It was so cryptic.

"What did she want?" I asked, thinking this was the easier question of the two.

I don't think he knew what he wanted.

"She… Well… She wanted marriage and a family… and… and _children_ and…" He spoke of the things I would give everything up for with disdain, and even though it was irrational for me to want, it still made me sad he didn't want these things too…

It felt like something important for us to be compatible in even if it was impossible, but yet again we were at odds.

It broke my heart to think he didn't share my deepest dream, and I thought I'd never felt heavier in my heart.

"You didn't… want that?" I asked, my heartbreak very obvious in my voice.

"Well, eventually maybe I don't know. It didn't cross my mind really."

"It was more than all that… Dolly… wanted to fix me. She'd _always_ wanted that. I just didn't see it at first because she was too good at hiding it." He gritted his teeth at the end of his sentence, betrayal in his eyes for a brief moment. "She was constantly makin' me aware of all the ways I fell short and I was addicted to the toxicity of it. She reminded me I was nothing, and I stuck around because I believed it…"

"She was the town preacher's daughter." I watched his face change then into something unimaginably dark, something I hadn't seen since…

"What's the matter?" I asked.

"I recognized him that night… The night I killed all those goddamned bastards back in Tennessee… He was one of 'em…" He could barely say it. "He…"

I tried to keep my expression even as I watched his descend into darkness, but that was unimaginable horror.

Someone your community was supposed to trust…

"That's awful… I'm sorry." I exhaled, hating that.

"Almost wish I coulda told him what I'd done with his perfect Christian daughter, the things_ she_ did, and that might've killed him more painfully." Emmett said unthinkingly and venomously as the monster he was in the memory. "Made him suffer."

I flinched.

It hurt more than I expected it would.

"Shit. Sorry." Emmett apologized, snapping back into the present. "That was… very _inappropriate_ for me to say."

"It's fine." I could barely say this lie out loud. It hurt.

"No, it's not. I…"

"I'd rather know." I settled on, and I actually meant it.

Even if it hurt, something in me wanted to know.

I wanted to know _everything_.

"Did you?…." I started to ask, but I couldn't even form the words. "I mean… I know that's personal to ask, but… With _her_?… I…"

"Yeah, we did." He looked away from me to answer.

"How many others?" I asked the real question.

"Rosalie…" He protested a little, and he kept his gaze away.

"Emmett?" I pressed, venomous annoyance at his reticence pooling in my mouth.

"I… I don't know." He answered, but this wasn't dismissive.

He _honestly_ didn't know.

"Guess." I commanded.

"A lot." He told me evenly, still looking out to the horizon and away from my eyes.

I groaned exasperatedly, something in my stomach feeling sick.

I held my head in my hands not really knowing how I was feeling in this moment.

"Oh, Rosalie. None of those girls could hold a candle to you. I was just a stupid guy without any real direction and… and you're the only one that's ever mattered to me..." He reached out, squeezing my cold shoulders. "I love you. Please believe me. You have to believe me. None of that matters at all now."

"Gimme a second." I breathed deeply, shrugging him off..

After a long, excruciating moment, I decided.

"Tell me everything." I pressed with a nervous tremble to my voice.

"Rose…" He protested, obviously not wanting to hurt me with this information.

I decided I'd rather know because if I didn't it would eat me alive for eternity.

"I want to know. I deserve to know." I explained. "Tell me from the beginning."

He sighed, looking away from me.

"I don't think…" He started.

"Tell me!" I said strongly, my voice raising enough it could shatter the icy winter air.

"The first time I was thirteen or so… My mother had been friends with her. I'd grown up with her kids… Her name was Sarah. She was a widow. My mama didn't want her to starve…. So she sent me every so often with food from our fields and to just do some work around her house since she didn't have anyone else. Her husband had died a couple months before, and the town knew she'd gone kinda crazy after… But, she was just real lonely… And, I was… _young _and naive." He started. "And… well… I didn't know…"

Young? My God he was thirteen years old… He was a child, and a woman that could've been his mother took advantage of him. My eyes widened and I knew my expression had betrayed me when he caught my eyes.

"You wanted to know." He reminded me.

I just nodded.

I still had to know.

"Then, a girl I'd grown up with, Francie Tidwell a few months later. And then…"

"No, tell me about her." I insisted on knowing, wishing I knew everything about her, about everyone.

"She had red hair." Emmett recalled, this seeming to be the only detail he could recall.

I just chewed on my bottom lip wondering if he wished I had red hair.

"Then… a girl named June Pritchett. She made moonshine that'd knock you flat on your back." Emmett snorted humorlessly, obviously still not wanting to talk to me about this.

He imagined himself vulnerable sharing this information, but it was me that was vulnerable.

"A girl named Violet… She was visiting town for the day and I carried her bags to her car from the train station."

"Baby... I mean Ira Sanders..." He actually seemed to be made heavier by this confession. "She was... my best pal Sam's sister so it shouldn'ta happened. We lied to him and... snuck behind his back, and... we both agreed it was a mistake."

"Then, Laura... Something? She was… I don't remember how I met her."

"Nancy Jones... I... I saw her in town a few times."

"Hannah… No… Her sister… Um…"

I didn't know how many girls's names I could hear, but the names he didn't remember hurt just as much.

"And Felicity Brown." He went on, giving up on remember that other girl's name. "She worked at the school."

"I think that's enough." Emmett turned away from me, stopping at what I'd imagine wasn't even scratching the surface.

It just turned the dagger in my heart deeper though as I imagined how he knew this information hurt me and my mind ran wild imagining all the names he didn't say.

"When you're finished." I said, trying to stay strong and assured.

He sighed.

"No… Rosalie…" He protested. "This is pointless, and I hate this. I hate hurting you with things that had _nothing_ to do with you. I hate this look in your eyes…"

"It will hurt me more if I _don't_ know, and it _does_ have something to do with me now." I said, my voice wobbly and unsure.

"No. It _really_ doesn't. You knowing about something I did when I was seventeen years old doesn't serve any function to our relationship with each other now or in the future. It isn't relevant at all." He tried to say.

I clenched my jaw, not sure of what I was really wanting to say…

"But it _will_ affect me…" I breathed

"How? I'm not saying you're wrong, but I just don't see it. I wanna see what you see. How is it going to affect you?"

I was too prideful to admit even the tiniest of reasons it affected me in my jealousy.

"Well… I don't know…" I mumbled, turning away.

"You do. Talk to me." He pushed lightly, trying to find my eyes.

I knew, based on his assuredness and frankly, the way his fingers made my body sing that he knew what he was doing. I knew he'd been with someone else, so it wasn't a surprise or even a disappointment. I assumed he was sexually experienced even before I really even knew.

It was just an accepted fact with no true weight until I got more involved with him...

My mind ran away with it because it was getting more and more personal to me.

Could I tell him all that was swimming through my head?

Thinking about him with other women….

It _terrified_ me.

It was more than retrospective jealousy.

I felt like his past was something threatening our current, budding relationship and my anxiety was on high.

What kind of expectations would he have for me?

Would he think about them when he was with me?

Will he want someone else and reject me?

Were they better than me?

The uncertainty was almost too much for me to bear.

I was anxious… sad… angry…. _out of control_….

Maybe that's why I was insisting on torturing myself with this.

"What are you _really_ trying to communicate through making me tell you all that?" He asked intuitively. "How was that helping us in your mind?"

I paused, waiting on my thoughts to catch up in my rampant mind.

"Well, I don't think it's an outlandish expectation to know about your past when we're… doing _whatever_ it is we're doing." I lashed out, but he could handle it.

He knew I was dismissing what was really going on between us by not giving it a label, but honestly labels on this were incredibly difficult anyway so he didn't protest.

"Are you trying to drive distance between us?" He asked. "Did you ask just to sabotage us? To scare yourself away from me… _again_?"

"No." I answered honestly, I think, but maybe he saw something I didn't and it made me panic.

I wanted to murder every single person he'd ever had sex with, and I could. I could do it…

It was irrational and I felt like a psycho.

"I just want to know…." I took a deep breath wishing I could make sense of all the tangle in my mind.

"What do you want to know? I'll tell you." He assured me, his honesty unconditional.

I played out his sexual experiences like a moving picture in my mind and I thought I was going to drop dead right here. It was like it was happening right here, and right in front of me.

I worried incessantly, unable to picture a reality now that I wouldn't latch on to their names and create elaborate stories surrounding them.

Then, I wondered if he'd said the same things to them that he said to me. I wondered if he looked at them the way he looked at me. I wondered...

"I… want you all to myself." I finally said, unable to look at him as I said this.

He was pleased though because of what I expressed, and I saw his dimples out of the corner of my eyes.

"You_ do_ have me all to yourself, Rosalie." He said, kissing my cheek and letting his lips linger as if asking for a kiss but I couldn't do it.

I imagined the reverse of it and it made me sick, wondering how he would respond to what happened to me… The damage I carried that in my mind, made me less his. Even though I had no control over it. I wanted to be all his… I wanted him to be the only person that had ever and will ever touch me…

I was projecting, but I would not acknowledge it. I wouldn't.

It was a control thing to me.

"But…"

"It was all before I knew you." He assured me.

I clenched my jaw and crossed my arms trying not to look like I was pouting, but it was impossible.

I was pouting.

"Are you needing validation from me?" He raised an eyebrow.

I would've rolled my eyes, but he wasn't joking.

I felt his sincerity and his sincere desire to assure me if I needed it.

And honestly… I think he might've been right.

So, I just nodded.

"Rosalie, I love you. I have never been in love before, and I've never felt so secure in someone in my entire life. You are beautiful, and intelligent, and headstrong, and captivating. Every new thing I learn about you makes me love you more." He spoke these flowery words with such conviction.

The forefront of my mind for the moment was about his insatiable hunger for sex due to his promiscuous past, and if I'd be enough for him now so I went with that.

"Will you…be faithful to me?"

He almost couldn't believe what I was saying.

"Of course, Rosalie. That's ridiculous." He took my face in his hands, kissing my lips quickly as he saw the storm of insecurity in my eyes.

"Eternity is a long time." And right when I said it, my stomach dropped to my knees, hating I was even implying our commitment to one another.

I worried it would be stifling to him and I would sound crazy and desperate.

"I understand that." He smiled though, seeming pleased and it lightened my heart. "I only want you. Always. You have to believe me."

"I don't know if I can." I breathed in self destruction after how my heart began to settle into the security of our relationship.

"Because I had sex before I knew you existed?" He tested. "I will talk you through your feelings and assure you the best I can, but I won't be made to feel guilty for the rest of eternity. I want you to know that has nothing to do with you."

He had a point and it filled me with rage.

I gritted my teeth, hating the war going on within me.

I was being torn apart and the looming, awful puppeteer of my own past was pulling my strings and making me think and feel things I didn't want.

I…. _I_ was the one filled with guilt with each passing moment._ I_ wanted to give him everything, every part of me. _I_ wanted _him_ to be the only person that had ever…

"I don't know what to say…" I exhaled.

"None of it matters anymore." He said.

"It does to me." I said through my teeth.

"I want you to tell me _why_ it still matters." He pressed.

"Because…" I whined, hating the way my voice sounded so brokenly desperate.

"It was all just _meaningless sex_, you know?" He tried again, a different way of going about it.

That was the dumbest thing he could've ever said and it made me fume.

I clenched my jaw. I think he meant the meaninglessness as a good thing, but I couldn't accept that in my own warped reality right now.

"No, I _don't_ know what that's like." I said tightly, the hostility in my voice betraying me as my hands came off of him entirely. "Sex means something to me."

It meant something to me and it had been stolen from me… painfully. I wanted to preserve it for someone that _loved_ me…

Now, I was dirty and unworthy despite my best efforts and it was _meaningless_ to him?

It seemed to diminish everything I held inside, every ounce of my pain.

"Rosalie…" He groaned, wiping his hands over his face. "That's not what I meant. It means something to me with you. I love you."

I knew what he meant, and it illuminated a harsh reality for me.

_My_ past experience with physical intimacy, or really the lack thereof in my case, was a weight on my new experiences and _his weren't_.

He didn't take these experiences into our relationship. He was right... His sexual experiences had nothing to do with me.

They had nothing to do with our relationship.

But mine... Mine did. I took my experience into our relationship. Even though it had nothing to do with him, I brought my experiences forward.

He wasn't allowing his past to weigh on his present like I was. He wasn't letting his past dictate his future.

He was free of the chains of the past, but I…

_I was still a prisoner. _

Could I be freed?

My trauma seemed to be a heavier and heavier burden with each passing day, and as time marched on and my relationship with Emmett was getting more and more valuable to me, I was realizing just how much I wanted to be free of my pain.

I was realizing how I wanted to tell him... so he would understand...

But, I wanted to tell him... for me. I needed to share my burdens to lighten my load and to stop letting my past haunt my present.

Was I brave enough to face these ghosts?


	26. Never Let Me Go

Quick note: HOORAY FOR NEW READERS!

Thank you endlessly for your reviews and encouragement! It makes me SO HAPPY to see your responses! Thank you for investing in me and this story! In this uncertain time, I hope this story provides you some sort of escape or comfort. I'm sending all my love to you all. ALSO, HOW EXCITING FOR A MIDNIGHT SUN RELEASE!

This chapter IS A DOOZIE at 11,000 words and expands upon the last. This chapter, along with the last have taken shape as perhaps the most important parts of this entire work and why I wanted to write this in the first place. There's a definite need for discussion on healing after trauma and the secondary victims of sexual assault in particular: the partners of survivors. I have so much love and respect for the couple SMeyer gave us with Emmett and Rosalie, and I think they had to navigate through incredibly difficult things together even before contemporary social developments that began to equip us for these difficult conversations, but that are unfortunately so real for too many people.

One exchange in particular beyond when Rosalie tells Bella that Emmett is exactly the kind of person someone like her needed is actually in the few chapters Stephenie Meyer released from Midnight Sun long ago in an exchange between Emmett and Edward. Edward mentions to Emmett or thinks it, I can't remember and she's taken it down today so I can't check for the exact quote, but Edward tells Emmett Rosalie's more work than a pretty face is worth. This REALLY triggered me and while it may not have been inherently meant this way, I couldn't help but think it was in reference to her trauma because while she is much more than what happened to her, there's a lot to sift through and detach from her identity in the process of being more than her trauma. I know you guys are FULLY aware of how much I love Rosalie and Emmett, but this is sort of hit the pinnacle for me. The two of them represent a whole lot more to me than I felt was written from Bella and Edward's limited perspectives, and they truly exhibit qualities of deep understanding of their partner.

I also find it incredibly interesting to note they live apart from the rest of the Cullen family habitually, and Edward even mentions this to Bella. This was in reference to Emmett and Rosalie's sexual relationship and how the others can't stand being around them, but I believe it's interesting to imagine they had a disconnection from the others that was more deeply rooted in how they understood one another and all the private dealings they had to navigate together apart from outsiders.

\- ! I want to emphasize that in order to write Rosalie into her time period of 1935, and specifically her society life and manners, there's some reference to her beliefs on sex and physical intimacy that are incredibly warped and dated \- particularly in regards to purity culture.

After the last few chapters focused on Dorothy's loneliness and limited understanding of the supernatural dealings happening around her, and the frustration she's beginning to feel for Rosalie's cryptic nature because of these misunderstandings, I felt this chapter had to return to the core of the work, but also set things up for Emmett's loyalties to be tested in later chapters in a far more realistic and conflicting way. This is to come. ;) And to help set up a little more clearly, the exchange between Dorothy and Rosalie that is coming up after this. I wanted Rosalie to be in a vulnerable place, an emotionally exhausted, low place when she goes to meet Dorothy - a new rock bottom.

ALSO: I wanted to create a reason for Rosalie's connection to the mirror, as it's something defining to her character and I found a spin on it that I feel is very canon. I hope this comes across!

*******NOTE: This chapter details Rosalie's sexual assault and how she recalls it for Emmett. ! PLEASE SKIP THIS CHAPTER IF YOU FEEL THIS WOULD PLEASE BE COMPROMISING TO YOUR MENTAL/EMOTIONAL HEALTH ! PLEASE STAY HEALTHY AND TAKE CARE OF YOURSELVES!**

_chapter notes if you want to skip this one: the chapter begins with a conversation between RxEm about sex, particularly why he doesn't think she's ready and his assumptions about her purity that Rosalie is triggered by. After detailing her assault, Emmett reacts with love and support and the two of them explore new boundaries in their physical relationship._

Please pleeaaaaaase consider leaving a review! Every word means the world to me! Thank you immensely for your words thus far.

**TW/CW: sexual assault, ptsd, purity culture, trauma**

Also just FYI, it's definitely very_ lemon-y_ at the end of this chapter ! YOU WERE WARNED if you don't like that stuff, read the chapter description above and just wait til the next chapter to continue reading. Or just avoid the last 1/6th of this.

* * *

**Never Let Me Go**

_Looking up from underneath_  
_Fractured moonlight on the sea_  
_Reflections still look the same to me_  
_As before I went under_

_And it's peaceful in the deep_  
_'Cause either way you cannot breathe_  
_No need to pray, no need to speak_  
_Now I am under_

_Oh, and it's breaking over me_  
_A thousand miles out to the sea bed_  
_Found the place to rest my head_

_Never let me go_

* * *

**Rosalie**

"I…" I was so nervous.

"I want to know why…. why you…"

He waited, running his hand through my hair, and I looked away in shame.

"Why you wouldn't…" I swallowed, unable in my own vanity to even say it out loud. "Why you didn't _want it_ with me…"

He took a deep breath.

"Rosalie…" His voice caressed my name. "Of course I want it with you. In that moment, I could've jumped clean out of my skin I wanted you so badly."

"But…." He started with the but that I knew was coming. "I don't know how to say this without hurting your feelings."

"Then don't try to spare them." I said tightly.

"I don't want to have sex with you when you're not ready to give me what I need from you." He told me.

I felt sick, his expectations coming center stage now and I wasn't ready to confront them.

"I don't think it's fair to you, but it's not fair to _me_ either. I love you and that complicates things. I want you for the long haul, and I wanna protect you right now even if I'm protecting you from yourself. That makes me wary of having sex when you're not ready for all of what that means to me."

"I _am_ ready." I felt exposed, only half heartedly arguing.

"Rosalie, listen… I love you and I want to have sex with you _because_ I love you. Right now I know you love me, but you don't want to have sex with me for that reason." He observed intuitively and I hated how he saw the inside of me so clearly.

"I…" I stumbled over the words. "Well… I… I do. I have good reason…"

"I'll tell you what it looks like to me, and you tell me if I'm right." He suggested.

Without waiting for me to agree, he began.

"Besides the obvious, that you find me charming and irresistible of course…" He couldn't let the opportunity pass for a joke, but I was thankful for it in this moment as it dispelled some of the tension and nervousness.

"It looks like you think sex is going to fix some sort of disconnection you feel from me." He said.

I clenched my jaw.

"It looks like you think that sex is what _I_ want from you so you have to give it to me in order for _me_ to give you something_ you_ need from me in a sort of transaction. Instead of just asking me for what you need…"

My stomach dropped.

He sidestepped, reading something in my face.

"What do you need from me, Rosalie?" He asked.

"Nothing…" I exhaled, looking away from him in this vulnerability, hating every second he got closer…

"Everyone needs _something_." He told me.

"Do you need to know you can trust me?" He guessed. "Because there are plenty of other ways to do that than sex."

"What do _you_ need from me that you think_ I_ can't give you right now?" I asked, turning the tables and referencing his first point.

He took a deep breath.

"I love you, Rosalie, and that's _new_ to me. When I said it was meaningless sex before, I meant it. I don't… I don't know how to navigate the part of sex when it actually _means_ something, and it makes me extra _cautious_ with you. I've never had sex with someone that I love or with someone that loves me, actually _loves_ me."

He spoke of his deepest vulnerabilities with wariness, but openness, understanding what he was asking of me was important to him enough to articulate clearly to me.

"That makes me very… _protective_ of you and that look in your eyes that tells me you're not ready. It makes me hyper-aware of the problems that could arise from rushing into anything because I want you for the long haul. When I see that… it… _scares_ you, no matter how much I want it, that changes everything for me."

He searched my face for answers to the questions in his mind.

"I'm not afraid." I tried a last ditch effort knowing I was just hurting my cause with how my voice shook.

"Don't lie to me." He requested softly. "You should know by now that you don't have to. It's okay."

I looked up into his eyes, seeing the entirety of the galaxy in his irises. The universe moved and reshaped within his gaze and I surrendered myself to it, a world he created in which it was….

It was okay.

_I_ was okay…

"Can I ask you something?" I started, needing to physically tether myself to him to ask the words out loud.

I reached for his arm, winding my fingers around his elbow as I ducked my head into him. He wound his arm around me, feeling my anxiety as he squeezed me tight.

"Anything." He said sincerely, his voice velvet as the sky.

I swallowed my anxiousness, knowing he would be honest with me.

I vibrated with nervous energy.

"Will it hurt?" I asked, my voice broken and echoing with fear.

He looked down at me then, pulling away to search my face.

It was obvious he didn't expect me to ask that.

I worried.

"No. Rosalie, I wouldn't hurt you." He swore the oath to me, but it only made me more nervous.

He took a deep breath, pulling me back into his arms, but making sure I still was looking straight into his eyes so I could see his seriousness and process the truth.

"Maybe it'll hurt a little at first, but then it won't." He assured me, running a hand through my hair and cradling my face.

"Okay." I accepted.

We stayed silent for a long moment, then he sighed before speaking, something soft and kind in his eyes I didn't recognize.

"Rose, if you don't like something, tell me and I'll stop." He caressed my cheek, looking deep into my eyes.

"Really?" I asked, my dead heart rising and falling in my center.

"I swear." He said strongly.

"Just talk to me. Tell me what you want and what you like and don't like. We'll never do anything you're uncomfortable with." Emmett held my face in his hands, worshiping me like I was the most precious thing on earth.

It made me nervous because I trusted him…

So much…

And this exchange made me love him more than I ever thought possible.

"Rosalie, if you're worried, about being a virgin… We'll go slow." He told me kindly. "I'll take care of you."

Like I'd been splashed with cold water, I pushed out of his arms.

The glaring, heavy weighted trauma within me showed itself now.

"Hey, hey, hey, it's okay." He misread the intent of my reaction.

"I can't." I protested to the intrusive thoughts in my mind that told me I would burst if I didn't tell him.

"You can't what?" He reached out, pulling me back into his arms.

I remained stone, but felt myself trembling as he continued to stroke my hair.

He cradled me in his arms and kissed my forehead in comfort.

Empathy rolled off of him in waves, and the trauma of my past was knocking at the door to my heart begging to be shared and understood by someone I loved and someone that loved me.

But, I still felt so much shame… My demons told me this made me unworthy of his love….

However, I realized that I wasn't wanting to talk about it because I wanted to see if he'd take on my baggage. I wanted to tell him because I loved him, and _I_ wanted to heal so _I_ could be happy and enjoy our relationship.

I owed that to him, but mostly _I owed it to myself_.

I trusted him to help me.

"I don't know if I'm strong enough." I took a deep breath of his skin, tethering myself to the present with his scent.

I wanted to be free of this pain.

"Then let me help you." He said lightly, whispering it into my hair as he held me tight.

I clutched fistfuls of the fabric of his shirt, closing my eyes.

He sensed something was wrong, wrapping his arms around me in a haven.

"But, I'm afraid you won't want me anymore." I said in a hollow breath of revelation into his chest.

"Rosalie, I want you _so_ much it devours me." He said, kissing any part of my face his lips could reach.

I stiffened and he slowed, starting to pull away.

"I have to tell you something…" I started, not sure if I could do it.

"Okay." He nodded, his eyes darting over my face but submerging his frantic worry with an outward calmness.

I took a deep shaky breath, my hands trembling.

"And… And I don't know how…"

"I don't know if I'm strong enough to do it…" I breathed.

"You are. You're plenty strong enough." He tried to convince me.

"I don't know…" I breathed.

"Let me help you, baby." He whispered. "What do you need me to do?"

"I need to tell you, but… I don't know if I'm ready to tell you everything, just… just some of it and… I just… I just need you to listen. No questions."

"Okay." Emmett radiated warmth and calmness and it helped me take a deep, shaky breath to center myself.

"And I… I don't know how much I can say…"

"However much you can say is enough." He nodded.

"Okay." I took a deep breath, preparing.

"I was walking home alone…" I started and I thought I was going to throw up with just these words. "It was April… It was too cold for April."

Even these details, the details I clung to so I wouldn't forget, were difficult to say out loud to him.

"I didn't call my father to escort me home. I should have. The street lamps were already on… It was late. I didn't know how late… I was at a friend's house… She had a baby… _Henry_…"" I breathed, being swept away.

He noticed and reached for my hand.

I withdrew it. I couldn't be touching him right now.

He understood.

I shook my head, refocusing.

"It was just a short walk home… Just a few blocks… Not even ten minutes…" I went on recalling the name of each street I would pass. "But under one of the broken street lamps, there was… there was a group of men…"

I looked down and away, seeing clearly every detail of that night. I remembered the smell of the alcohol as I approached.

"They were drunk. One of them called my name… He knew me…" I went on not sure how to proceed. "And I… I knew him… I… I was _engaged_ to him. We were to be married within the week…"

I took a deep breath, and Emmett seemed to follow this pattern, just this one note of information being a lot to process.

"They were all well dressed. Sons of all the richest men in town, but he… _Royce_…" I snarled his name. "My fiancé, well, he was richer than them all… He was a _King _after all. That was even his name… And it would've been mine too."

I shivered.

"I knew them… But, I… I was surprised to find them drunk. They didn't drink champagne at all the parties. Just a toast every now and then." I began, my heart climbing to my throat, and I decided then to tether myself physically to the present as I guided Emmett's arm around my shoulders.

He was careful, like I was porcelain.

"Royce grabbed my arm… He said they'd been waiting for me… I didn't fight back. I didn't know… I didn't know what was going to happen…"

"Em, don't say anything." I looked up at him then, removing myself from the past and jerking back into the present. "Please."

Emmett just nodded, understanding.

"He… bragged on me, and I… I liked that. Insisted to one of his friends that I was more beautiful than any of the girls in Georgia, and Southern girls… have a reputation you know… Well... You _do_ know." I exhaled, momentarily distracted by my attempt at a joke.. "But… But his friend told him it was hard to tell with my clothes on…"

I felt him stiffen, as I knew he would, no doubt looking on me with disgust and disbelief.

"So… R-_He_… tore the coat off my shoulders and the hat out of my hair…"

I couldn't even tie his name to that sentence.

My guilt washed over me in a wave, and I pulled away just enough to see that he wasn't looking down on me in disgust of disbelief.

He was looking down on me in _concern_.

I paused for a long while, spiraling in self-loathing before I could form a sentence.

"They enjoyed… my pain… I didn't understand." I exhaled.

"How could someone… _like_ that…" I shivered. "There were five of them. Royce had two of them hold my arms as he ripped my stockings and pushed me into the brick wall… He told me I'd been asking for it. He… told me I had been denying him, but he was _entitled_ to me… however and whenever he wanted. He told me I was a dirty whore for wanting…"

Emmett was vibrating with pent up energy then, and he tightened his arm around my shoulder.

I worried then if he would think…

But, "I _didn't_. I didn't want it. I… I didn't want…"

He was silent, just listening as I'd told him to.

I couldn't bear to look up at him because I was afraid of what I'd find.

I didn't know if I could say anymore…

But I had to, and I wanted to heal.

And this was about _me_…

So I didn't spare a detail. I had to tell someone else or it'd eat me alive.

"I said no…. and I _meant_ no." My voice shook.

"But, they didn't stop. They held me down while he undid his pants. I'd figured out what was going on by then, and I tried to start fighting. I'd pulled out of one of their arms then and I started to run, but Royce caught me and pushed me flat on my stomach, climbing onto my back."

"I remember… my chin hit the ground and I… I bit down on my tongue… I busted my nose… I was… so…._ fixated_ on him ruining my face then." I traced my fingers over my lips, physically unscarred.

"Because I think… I think I was in denial of what he was going to do to the rest of me… My nose… My mouth… That was so… _insignificant_ to the rest… He told me what he wanted… and… and it was so _violent_… I'd never thought of it… like _that_… I'd never thought of it before at all… I told him no. I _begged_ him not to. He hit me, then he pulled my hair yelling that I was _ungrateful_… That I was… embarrassing him in front of his friends…"

"He spit on me, and told me I deserved… I thought… I thought he was blaming me for what he was doing… I thought I should've dressed more modestly, that I should've…"

I swallowed, knowing I had to recenter myself to tell until I couldn't tell any more.

"But when he pushed up my skirt I… I… I didn't fight back. I'm so ashamed… I didn't… I didn't fight back." I said and I turned my face into Emmett's chest. "I'm not… I'm not _strong_, like you think I am…"

"Rose…" He started, unable to stay silent any longer.

"Stop!" I silenced him strongly, pushing away. "I didn't… I didn't _fight_ back. I should've… I… I was just… _frozen_. I couldn't… And… And worse than all that… It's so… awful… I don't get it… I didn't… I didn't want to _hurt_ him."

A wild, humorless high pitched scoff caught in my throat as I admitted some things to him so dark I didn't even think of them most times.

"I was still… _holding on_. I couldn't let go. I didn't… want to hurt him… I thought… I thought he loved me… I didn't think he'd actually… ever…. But, he did. He grabbed the back of my hair and shoved me down. And it hurt. He _liked_ that it hurt. He liked that I cried. He told me he wanted me to scream… He made me say things…"

I shivered.

"I didn't understand. I wanted it to be over, but when he finished, he flipped me over onto my back and pinned my arms above my head. I looked up at him, into his eyes, blue as robin's eggs, but red and dilated in drunkenness. I thought when he looked at me, he'd… he'd stop. He'd let me go. He'd see me, and he'd remember… He'd remember he loved me… I had hope it was _over_ then, that I could go home. That I could shower and… _forget _about it… I thought it'd be that _easy_."

"I remember wondering if I could cover my blood and bruises with makeup for our _wedding_…" I took a series of swift inhales, recalling the pain and the irrational patterning of my thoughts. "I thought about what I'd have to say to my parents when I got home, about the blood… the bruises... The ripped dress…"

"I didn't want to let go… I… Even _then_, I looked up at him and I thought about the life I'd imagined for myself… I didn't think it was too much to ask for. Fair haired children, a lawn of green grass, a husband, a kitchen someone else would cook in… Beautiful dresses…"

"I… I was worried about the weather… I… remember thinking it was too cold for a wedding…"

My voice was incredibly calm, recalling that otherworldly calmness I felt in that moment between…

"I remember I said… I said… God, I was so _stupid_. 'I'll see you tomorrow… Sober…' I thought he'd take me up on it. I thought it was _over_."

"But he stood up, started redoing his pants and he passed me off to his friends. He'd lost a poker game that night… He told them I was the pay up. That it'd settle his debts to them. One of them argued that it wasn't enough now that I wasn't a virgin anymore… I was _worth less_…"

I'd forgotten then, the point of reliving this trauma, and Emmett's arm tightened around my shoulders.

I checked in with myself, deciding I had to share more, that I wanted to share more. I needed to share more. His presence helped remind me this was in the past.

There was nothing to be afraid of right now.

"I wondered a lot in the beginning if he'd won that poker game if I'd still be alive… If it would've stopped there… But it didn't. He let them torture me too. Each one worst than the last. Doing things… to my body that…"

"God, then I _hated_ him… The only thing that got me through the pain was focusing on how _much_ I hated him. When Royce passed me around to his friends, letting them have their turns, I watched _him_."

"Drinking from the bottle, smug. Brown-Forman, medicinal whisky… I remembered thinking he was too proper to drink that, and it was bad manners to drink from the bottle. I wondered why he hadn't spent the money for a good bottle of liquor. Isn't that ridiculous? My hatred and my anger made me frozen, but I watched him…"

"A couple times, when it was especially awful, I _begged_ him to save me…I think I always thought Royce would stop it. He definitely had the power to. _Power_… I thought he'd stop it all. I feel so _stupid_ now."

"Royce was angry at _me_ for what _they_ were doing. He told me I was a dirty slut because I liked it… I _didn't_… like it. God, how could anyone? He watched me cry while they desecrated my body, and he told me it was my fault."

"It was no good to scream. They'd cover my mouth… They'd… choke me so I couldn't… It was no good to cry, though they asked me to. They told me to do a lot of things, but I'd left my body. The sounds they made, the names they called me, the things they said… I remember it all because I was silent and I just listened, because I hated them and I wanted to remember every reason why. They were monsters, and _I hated them_."

"I never thought they were going to kill me, though I certainly hoped they would have. It would've been preferable." I mumbled. "But they thought I was dead, believe me I wanted to be, and they left me in the streets…"

"I… I… I decided I wanted to die because… Because I knew no one would believe me." I choked on my words in a panic.

"Royce… was… a kind… good man… from a good family. He was… _perfect_… Everyone… loved him… Respected him…" I went on, my mind going through a tangle of toxic thoughts.

"If I lived… _No one would believe me_."

I concluded, knowing this wasn't all I needed to say, but it was some…

It was more than I thought I could_ ever _say out loud, and I felt it like an open, festering wound that he could see now too.

I wasn't just imagining it.

He knew I had reached my limit then, and his hands hovered over me, scared to touch me.

I was thankful, needing to ease back into physical touch as I also came back into reality.

As I had requested, he didn't ask any questions. He was just there to listen.

I closed my eyes, tethering myself to the present by taking slow, deep inhales.

"Hold me." I requested then, and he wrapped me up in the haven of his embrace then.

I leaned my cheek into his chest and he pressed one of his hands into my back and the other cradled the back of my head.

We sat together our breath synchronizing in silence for what seemed like hours.

"_I_ believe you." He told me softly.

I took a deep, shaky breath something completely validating about hearing him say that.

"You did something extremely difficult, talking about this." He said plainly, validating why I suddenly felt exhausted. "I'm proud of you."

I didn't understand, but I felt my open wound begin to be cauterized by those words.

My breath felt heavy in my chest.

Then, I opened my eyes, but I was still afraid to look up at his face.

I was doubting myself.

"I know it wasn't easy to tell me." He said evenly.

I just shook my head, nervous as he processed and responded, but I could feel his calmness and it made me feel calmer too.

I took a deep breath and he seemed to help the oxygen flow into my lungs as I finally looked up at him.

It put me at an odd, exhausted ease.

"I'm so sorry." I said in an irrational response from my clouded brain.

"You have nothing to be sorry about." He told me directly. "You didn't do _anything_ wrong. You were assaulted and put in a very vulnerable position with no control over what happened. You were very brave talking about it with me."

His directness was soothing, and something about hearing him say those words out loud helped validate my pain and my darkness in a way that helped me start processing them as I'd never done before.

I just nodded.

"What can I do for you?" He asked plainly.

I hadn't expected him to ask me that, and I blinked slowly almost as if I was in shock.

Maybe I _was_ in shock.

I felt like I was floating away.

He noticed, taking my face in his hands lightly.

I centered myself, looking deep into his eyes.

In an irrelevant response to his question I just nodded. I couldn't form words. Time was moving really slowly.

He took me nodding though as a go ahead to touch me and he kept his hands on my face, staying locked into my eyes as a thousand years seemed to pass between my inhale and my exhale.

I hyper fixated then.

His hair was pushed back under his left ear. The more I thought about it, the more I decided I liked his ears. They were slightly too big, almost in a childish way but I found it oddly cute which seemed out of place on a grown man.

I smiled then, a tipsy smile as I traced my fingers along the curl behind his left ear, tucking his too-long hair behind his too big ears in a way that made me irrationally giggle.

His eyes darted over my face, staying calm but still with an edge of panic as he watched me respond, but I didn't let that concern register.

"Do you wear your hair long because you got teased for your ears growing up?" I asked.

"Yes." He said plainly, taking my hand and claiming it in his.

I looked down at where he touched me.

"I didn't hurt your feelings asking that did I?" I was concerned, finding his eyes again and my dead heart seemed to fill with nervousness that I'd hurt his feelings.

I looked down at our hands again, noticing, they were shaking.

"No. You didn't hurt my feelings." He said, keeping his voice even, but I was hyper fixated again, this time on his hands.

Just like his ears, his hands were large. They swallowed mine, so as I watched them trembling together, I knew it was his hands shaking _not_ mine..

If my hands were shaking, his could steady mine.

"Because I like your ears." I told him, my voice tapering off as I fixated on the frequency of the vibrations of our hands.

He snorted, a little breathy, odd laugh that was very unlike him.

He pulled his hand away from mine then, very slowly.

I watched my fingers.

The shaking stopped.

I looked back up at him.

"I'm glad." He said, a slight furrow to his brow as his eyes darted over my face seeing something I wasn't seeing.

"Are you all right?" I breathed, my chest feeling heavy all of a sudden.

"I'm fine, Rosalie. This isn't about me. Are _you_ okay?" He asked, but I heard it.

There was an edge to his voice.

He was worried.

I just nodded, taking a slow, deep breath.

I watched his hand, in a loose fist by his side.

Vibrating.

He wasn't really _calm_. He was just being calm _for me_, to make sure I was okay, that I was processing what I'd told him about me…

What I'd said had happened to me, not to some far off person. It had happened to _me_.

I'd told him.

And though it wasn't about him, he was affected.

I wanted him to have me totally, and in my mind, what happened to me made me less his.

It wasn't fair.

I didn't get a choice.

_He_ didn't get a choice and now he was sentenced to pick up the pieces.

I felt trapped in my body, suddenly imagining it was marked and he could see it…

I missed who I was before this so _so_ much…

He should have gotten _her_.

Romantic and sweet. Unburdened. In love with love.

She laughed, and danced, and twirled…

She felt safe.

She was enchanting…

Now that I wasn't her, who was I?

I was a monster.

I felt him looking at me, seeing me, but what was it he saw?

I was running…

The destination…

Would I ever get there?

The trauma of my past still drew blood, and still sent me into unimaginable pain.

I wanted him to understand.

I wanted him to forgive me my sins…

I wanted Emmett to know that what Royce had done to me had left even my perfect vampiric skin and my renewed psyche still in shambles.

But, I'd finally_ shown_ him the pieces. I'd finally revealed the rubble I was trying to reconstruct.

The task seemed daunting and overwhelming now.

The desolation now seemed too unbearable. Too impossible.

I didn't ask for this.

It wasn't my fault…

It wasn't my fault was it?

I felt embarrassed… A powerless victim, _vulnerable_…

My respiration transformed into swift, shallow breaths, panic rising in my chest as I began to feel vulnerable.

"Hey, hey, hey, Rose. Look at me. You're okay. You're okay. You're fine. You're with me." He began in assurance, obviously seeing my spiral before I even felt the crash. "You're safe. It's okay. Rosalie, it's okay."

"Don't leave me." I panicked, gasping.

"I'm not. I'm staying right here." He swore.

"I wanna go home. I wanna… go home. Emmett, I wanna…" I was breathing heavy, my eyes frantically looking over him.

"Okay." He nodded, trying to stay calm for me, but I saw it in his eyes.

I panicked, shaking like a leaf.

"Am I okay?" I panted. "What's wrong with me? I… I…"

I watched my hands start to shake as my body flowed with energy like nothing I'd ever heard. Venom pulsed wildly through my veins like the rush of being a newborn and I could've screamed with the way my insides wanted out.

"You're okay, Rosalie." He assured me, trying to keep his voice even but I could tell I was worrying him. "You're in shock. Something…. _horrible_ happened to you. But, you're safe now."

"Something happened?…" I was spiraling, and as he tried to help me stay on my feet, my legs buckled under me.

"You were assaulted. But, you survived. You'll survive this too."

I whimpered, feeling disconnected from my body then. Like in transformation, I took in every detail of my pain, processing it somewhere in another plane that crossed my brain and body.

"Am I okay? Em, tell me I'm okay?" I looked up at him, confused and searching, not sure which way was up or down as my head started to spin.

His arms threaded under my shoulders and tried to hold me up on my feet, but it was no use. My knees were unstable and I couldn't stand on my own.

"You're okay, baby." He nodded, staying calm, but he swiftly looked over his shoulder for something. "Do I need to get Carlisle?"

Carlisle…

"I wanna go home." I panted, grasping at his arms like I was drowning.

"Why don't you lie down for a second? Come on, lie down." He told me, descending to the grass with me.

He tried to guide me to my back, but I thrashed, immediately physically triggered.

"I don't wanna lie down. No! I don't wanna lie down. I…" I dug my fingers into his arm, my eyes pleading with him as I climbed him like a tree as I avoided the ground.

"Okay, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Come here." He pulled me close, wrapping his arms around my shoulders so I could be supported with my head on his chest. "Look in my eyes."

"I wanna go home." I begged him, doing as I was told and looking up at him again, fixating on the spectrum of colors in his eyes. "I…"

"We _are_ home. Everyone's just inside. About 300 yards. We're in the rose garden out back behind the house. In Denali." He told me softly, telling me details I would remember and process. "Do you need me to get Carlisle?"

"Don't leave me." I panicked, my eyes darting to my skin.

Snow.

Carlisle.

Pain.

I put both my hands on either side of my head.

"I'm not. It's okay." He told me, running a hand through my hair.

Pins… In the street…

I flinched away.

He pulled back.

"Rosalie, you're okay. You're safe. Look at me." He insisted, fighting for my eyes.

I took a deep breath.

Tobacco…

Thyme.

Cedar…

"Emmett…" I grabbed his arm, a fistful of fabric a new sensation that I felt between my fingers.

The tangible connection shocked my senses.

"I… I don't know what to do to help you, Rosalie. We need to get Carlisle." His voice shook a little bit.

The instability of his voice was enough to align with my inner instability and it knocked me out of my unhealthy orbit.

"It was snowing." I told him in a breathy exhale.

"What?" He tried to follow.

"That night… It was snowing." I told him as I distanced myself from the memory. "It was _so cold_…"

He carefully started to brush the snow off my shoulders and the ends of my hair in a sort of ritual of care.

Vampires didn't get cold, but I shivered.

"Here." He took off his jacket, threading my arms through it.

"Let's go get Carlisle." He encouraged. "He'll know what to do."

"I don't want Carlisle. I want _you_." I told him, closing my eyes and inhaling slowly, now in his coat, the scent surrounding me more deeply.

I was enveloped, and the scent helped me come back.

"All right." He agreed with a sigh. "Can you tell me what you need?"

He shouldered the weight of my burdens, taking them from me so I could feel lighter.

I didn't have the stamina to carry the weight of my past all the time, so he picked it up for me today and I exhaled into him, exhausted.

"A birdhouse. Eight chairs. A dining table. A cello." I listed under my breath.

"What?" He asked softly.

"It's what I see." I told him and he remembered that's what I told him I did when I got overwhelmed.

"Good." He nodded, looking over at my sight line and making sure, seeming to check my work. "Good."

"I'm scared." I told him.

"That's okay. I'm here for you." He assured me, a childish wideness to his eyes as he looked over my face.

"I… I feel like I'm unraveling."

"You're not. You're so strong. But if you were unraveling that's okay too. I'll be here for you to put yourself back together. Because you will. You can, and you will." He told me plainly. "We have plenty of time."

Those were beautiful words and they seemed to patch my wounds, lying open for him to see.

"I can?" I felt foggy, like I'd hit my head, but I clung to him.

"You _can_." He swore.

"I'm sorry." I apologized again.

"No. Don't do that. Don't apologize. You have nothing to be sorry for." He said directly. "Listen to me. You did _nothing_ wrong."

"But, I… I was so stupid…"

"Rosalie. You are _not_ at fault." He said strongly. "You couldn't have known."

"I thought he _loved_ me…"

"That's not love, Rosalie. That's not love. He _hurt_ you."

"Why would he do that?…" I couldn't grasp it in my mind and I panicked, like I was reaching for the rungs of a ladder, but I was falling…

"Because he's a _monster_. It has _nothing_ to do with you." He tried to get me to see.

I shook my head.

He moved on. Had a lovely life.

The life I wanted…

The life I deserved…

But, he… took it from me…

Yet… He still got _everything_.

I clenched my hands into fists, a tangible connection to my body as my nails dug into my palms.

Emmett and I sat in silence for what seemed like a century as I processed and calmed my inner world.

"Sometimes… When I look in the mirror, I see the bruises. I see the blood on my teeth, my broken nose. I see my hair ripped out of my head, my clothes… ragged. I look in the mirror and that's _all _I can see. The broken mess they made of me… So I just stare… and stare… and stare at myself just _waiting_ to see something different."

"I _can't _see anything different." I tried to keep my voice even.

"Then keep looking." He said, and I saw how much his instinct was to kiss me to make it better, but he didn't out of respect for my boundaries. "Because one day you _will_ see something different in that mirror, Rose."

I exhaled, closing my eyes as he lightly touched my cheek.

"I… I don't want this to _continue_ to define who I am." I breathed. "I've let it… For so long… I'm not… strong… like you are…" I breathed, ducking to press my forehead to his and close my eyes.

"Don't say that." He argued.

"Like what happened with your father… You didn't let it ruin you, but…. But, this… It's… it's _ruined_ me." The weight of that awful reality pushed down on my shoulders, making me feel heavy.

"No… Rosalie don't…" He protested softly, tracing his thumb across my cheek.

"But, I'm trying…" I said, trying not to let my voice shatter as I leaned into it.

"I know." He took a deep breath.

"I thought it was important that you knew… But… But I'm scared that's all you see when you look at me now." I said.

He took a deep inhale, cradling my face with value.

"I see how much I love you." He told me. "How strong you are… How resilient… How beautiful."

"And one day, you're gonna look in the mirror and see that too. You're going to survive this, Rosalie. You're going to heal, and I'm here for you while you do."

I felt his hands shaking in my hair, and he moved them thinking I hadn't noticed.

"Are you okay?" I asked him softly.

"Rosalie…" He said, drawing out my name.

"You're shaking."

He paused, knowing he'd been caught.

I worried this had all been too much. _I_ was too much.

Maybe I was redirecting and I actually needed to confront my _own_ emotions, but maybe I also needed to hear his thoughts to start healing. I needed to make sure he could process, so he could understand.

So he could understand me…

"I love you." Was all he could say at first, but it seemed like enough, except it was obvious how choosy he was being with his words and it alarmed me because that was so out of character.

"I… I just wanna make you feel safe right now, Rosalie." He told me, returning his hands to my hair now that he wasn't worried about me noticing them shaking. "Do you feel safe?"

I just nodded, everything around me starting to calm, so my inner word could hyper focus on him.

"Yes. I asked how _you_ feel." I asked him softly.

"I… Well… I don't know… I don't wanna say the wrong thing." He seemed to be treading lightly with me.

"Then say the truth." I said, sounding more confident in this than I felt.

"I just don't know what to do…" He admitted.

"You don't have to_ do_ anything. This is my fight." I exhaled, something about that filling me with an importance and purpose. "I told you because I just wanted you to understand… to understand me."

"I do. I do understand you." He claimed, his eyes locked into mine.

"And I want to understand_ you_." I turned the tables, wanting to hear what he had to say.

He took a deep breath and it

"All right then. I'm… _angry_… So angry…" His voice sent a chill down my spine. "Not at you. I could never be angry at you, Rosalie. I'm _not_ angry at you. I'm angry at them. I'm _not angry at you_."

"You've killed them..." He connected the dots then, and I knew by the flicker in his eyes he wanted to kill them again.

"I have." I couldn't help the tug at the corner of my mouth, but it was short lived as my stomach got a deep pit of emptiness.

"I'll tell you about it some time... Just... just not right now."

I did things that made me a monster...

He understood.

"You didn't do anything wrong. You're _perfect_, and…" He told me, taking a break to take a deep breath that filled his lungs, pulling away from me for a second. "I just… Rosalie, you're absolutely _perfect_. Do you know that? I need you to know that."

He spoke quickly then.

I just nodded, my eyes darting over his face.

"You're _perfect_, and strong, and…." His breath hitched in his throat.

"You're not angry with me?" I latched on to his words then, but they mismatched in my brain so I was resonating with the wrong ones.

"I could never-" He started.

"But, I… I'm not…. _me_ any more." My demons swirled in my mind.

"Well, I don't want that girl. I want _you_. Who you are _now_. Who you'll become as you fight through all this." He insisted, but I'd barely hear it as I tried to

"I… I'm… broken and _unclean_. I…" My demons swirled in my mind.

"Stop." He commanded. "Look at me."

I did what I was told, looking up at him.

"That has _no_ effect on your worth." Emmett took my face in his hands, steady and calm. "Do you understand me?"

I took a swift inhale, imagining I could explode with the wild feelings inside of me.

I heard him, but it was like he was far away and he was speaking in a language that was not my native tongue.

"Rosalie, look at me." He fought for my eyes. "That does _not_ affect your value."

My respiration was thick in my throat and I looked up into his eyes to see myself more clearly.

His focus on me _assigned_ me so much worth, gifting it and inflating it to the point I could burst. He looked at me with a reverent gaze as he held my face in his hands.

Could I believe him? Could I believe he saw me clearly?

I wondered if he just wanted to make me feel better.

"But… I want…" I couldn't even say it out loud, and I ducked away, covering my face with his hands.

"I want to…" I took a deep, painful breath. "Em, I want to give _you _that part of me… But, I _can't_… And… And it breaks my heart… I'll never… get that back… and…"

The tragedy of this was almost too much for me to bear.

He inhaled deeply.

He understood our earlier conversation in an entirely different light now.

When I finally looked up from where I held my face in my hands, I saw something in his eyes, something that almost broke me in two, and it reminded me exactly _why_ I wanted to give him everything.

I loved him in a way that was more than love…

He took me in his arms then, cradling me to him.

I felt his respiration, in and out, in and out…

"You're… trusting me… with _so_ much more…" He spoke sincerely, weight and significance in each word.

I clutched tighter to him not understanding and not believing.

"Even after everything, you're… you're trusting _me_ to show you… that it… it doesn't have to be that way."

He started to reach out for me, pausing. I leaned into his palm to urge him forward and he kissed me ever so lightly on the forehead.

"To show you… Rosalie… that's not… that's _not_ what it's supposed to be like. Love… Sex… _Any_ of it."

He would help me relearn what these things were. He would help me attach new experiences and new memories to these terms. I watched the significance he placed on this and it made me take a deep breath, my heart swelling.

"It's _overwhelming_… In a good way." Emmett gave me a little smile. "I mean… I want to be _worthy_ of the trust you're putting in me… I wanna do right by you and I know I _can_…"

I took a deep breath, comforted by his assurance and directness.

"I trust you." I told him, confirming his words as I looked up into his eyes, being swept away and centered by them all at once.

We were all that had ever mattered in the history of time.

"I want to take care of you. I want to…." He trailed off.

"I wanna show you Rosalie… Sex… it's something I'll do _with_ you not _to_ you… I…"

I bit my bottom lip, anxiousness rolling off of me as he revealed his own boyish nervousness regarding the topic.

It was highly uncharacteristic of him, but now it calmed me to sort of validate the pit in my stomach to something more like nervousness than dread or anxiety.

"It makes me nervous." I admitted.

"I know…" He told me with a nod. "And that's okay."

I exhaled, relieved by this small comfort.

"Will you talk to me about what makes you nervous?" He requested casually, brushing my hair behind my ear.

I took a deep breath then I sighed.

"Well… I… I'm afraid you won't… like it as much with me." I told him, hating feeling vulnerable.

He laughed, a full, unbridled laugh that echoed into the night air.

I gritted my teeth and frowned.

"_That's_ what you're nervous about?" He snickered. "Baby… I love you. And I guarantee you… I'll like it with you more than I could tell you."

I was only half comforted.

"I was expecting something serious." He chuckled again.

"I _am_ being serious." I grumbled.

"Rosalie… Loving you and wanting you like I do… I swear to you, nothing in this universe…." He expanded, not really sure what else to say to ease my mind.

I exhaled through my nose, knowing he'd given me all the validation in the world, and I just had to actually listen and absorb it.

"I'm nervous about the… _expectations_ you have for me." I switched directions.

"Like what?" He centered his attention to listen to my concerns.

My dead heart thumped menacingly in my chest as I thought about the things those men made me do to ensure their pleasure…

"Rosalie…" He seemed to understand before I even said anything.

"I just…" I bit my lip.

"_Nothing_ is more important to me than you." He said, strongly believing so. "I love you, and nothing I could ever want from you physically would be worth compromising you feeling safe with me. Do you understand?"

I took a deep, shaky breath, wondering what all he'd have to sacrifice to tailor to my skittishness.

He took my face in his hands.

"Rosalie, listen to me. Anything you don't like, we'll stop." He said with a nod of finality.

I believed him, but it made me sad.

He sensed it in my eyes and responded to it.

"That is_ not _a sacrifice to me." He insisted. "Because my pleasure doesn't exist without yours."

I had to look away.

It was hard for me to accept there were motives for sex beyond having a family, but Emmett and the others I was around insisted on sex for _pleasure_… and I was being seduced by the idea.

"You're supposed to _like_ it." He said then edited and clarified his statement. "No, I mean… You're not supposed to like what I tell you to like… but… it's my responsibility as your partner to make _sure_ you enjoy sex, to make sure I please you… or create a space where you can find pleasure. It's not supposed to be… _miserable_."

He spoke of such matters innocently and I squirmed in his arms, uncomfortable again.

"You're supposed to feel safe." He told me, reemphasizing this fact.

My view of intimacy had been so warped by the experiences I had and now, I don't know if I knew how to recognize it at all.

"I _know_ that." I sighed, completely exasperated, embarrassed, and frustrated.

"No, you don't." He brushed my hair off my face slowly.

I swallowed, intimidated by the shift in tone.

"Don't patronize me." I said through tight teeth at an attempt to distance myself.

"That's not what I meant to do." He said with steady eyes. "I just mean to say, no one's shown you any differently."

I nodded, understanding, but not relinquishing.

"_I_ want to make you feel safe. I want to show you love. And… and I want to show you _pleasure_."

"Well I…" I started, but didn't know how to finish.

If I could blush, I would have. He _knew_ pleasure. He spoke of it with command and capability. My own mind trailed to the climax of the earlier afternoon and my legs started to tingle.

Again.

I wanted it again.

"I want to know what _you_ like… what _you_ want." Emmett told me, and my stomach flipped. "I want to know how to please you."

It made me uncomfortable to have that much power… I didn't know what I liked… what I wanted…

"I…" I stumbled over my words, unable to think clearly.

"I don't _know_ what I like… what I want…" I admitted.

"You do. You just don't know how to ask for it." He told me clearly.

Maybe he was right. I bit on the inside of my cheek, thinking…

"Or… you don't think you should?" He deepened his understanding. "You're still a perfectly fine proper lady…"

I bit the inside of my cheek, wondering how to articulate my wants and needs, and it just mortified me.

It was deep in my programming to deny my desire, to squash it, to let myself be secondary…

Men were the ones that were supposed to know what they wanted, to indulge their desires…

"Ask me for what you want. I'll give it to you." He said, a suggestiveness to his tone that made me shiver.

It intimidated me, but I knew I could ask for this much…

"Kiss me." I told him, and he smiled, dimples framing his grin.

He kissed me, soft, sweet and light. It made me feel safe and cared for, and my body recharged to the present, finding a haven in him.

"I love you." He said against my mouth, and I braided my fingers into his hair, holding him to me.

"I know." I said, and this was the best thing I could say right now.

I _did_ know. I did believe him. I did trust him…

He was pleased, deepening the kiss.

"Put your hands on me." I told him, wanting his touch.

I couldn't help but notice the way his mouth twitched into a smile against mine, evidently amused at my heeding his request to tell him what I wanted.

I wanted him to touch me, and he did.

His hands were like wildfire on my skin, leaving trails of heat on me that melted the icy walls I'd built up in a fortress.

The warmth between us brought the kiss to a boil, and we clutched to one another, hot and desperate.

His mouth moved on to my jaw and neck and I sighed into the air that I'd just barely noticed was black as the deepest night now.

Though the darkness was of no consequence to our vampiric vision, it turned us both into silver slivers of moonlight as we twisted around one another in the snow.

I climbed into his lap, one knee on either side of his waist and his fingers closed in fists of fabric.

I started on the buttons at my chest, exposing the lace of my light blue slip dress underneath.

"I want more of you." I begged.

Our lips departed for a moment and Emmett's eyes, a sunset color flooded with red hot desire and his mouth submerged to my jaw and collarbone, deepening…

I shivered.

Before he could register this as reticence and misunderstand, I made myself clear by arching my back into his trailing kisses.

My head was spinning, as he spread his hand over my hip underneath my skirt.

His fingers found the edges of my panties and I couldn't help but melt into him. His other hand slid up my side and cupped my breast edging the fabric over, and I sighed into the icy air.

Emmett's hands and mouth explored my body with reverence and I wanted to be absorbed into his fingers.

The sleeve of my dress and the strap of my slip slid off my shoulder, exposing me to his light, velvet mouth.

My mind was a scramble, and as I looked up into the sky, all I saw was a haze of pleasure in the stars.

His fingers up my skirt got closer to the edge, so my body twitched in an immediate reaction as I listened to my desire to be touched.

He returned to my mouth and I eagerly crushed my lips to his. His tongue swirled around mine before he pulled back to suck my lower lip between his teeth. I inched my hips forward onto him, my body responding.

His fingers up my skirt traced over the edge of my underwear.

His hand on my chest, he replaced to the middle of my ribs to direct me to lie on my back, switching positions with me.

I nodded and bit my lip, feeling exposed and vulnerable as my dress laid open for him once again and his hand remained up my skirt.

The alarm in my mind was almost silent as I was flat on my back under him, and the majority of my focus was locked on him only.

The hand up my skirt traced up and down my center over the fabric of my underthings and I squirmed, exhaling in a whimper of anticipation.

"You want me." It wasn't a question. He stated.

My voice was caught in my throat and my mind was a numb mess as I focused exactly on the location of his fingers.

I wanted them in me.

I just nodded.

He traced his other thumb across my bottom lip from where he sat on his knees atop of me.

I took his thumb into my mouth and he exhaled with unquenchable desire as he brought his remaining fingers to my hair. He hooked his thumb into my mouth, holding me to him with some light pressure on my tongue. Then as he watched... I gave his thumb a little suck.

He was undone then, and I saw the raw pleasure in his eyes.

He was torturing me as the tips of his fingers dove past the fabric, but waited at my center.

I moved my hips so I could feel his fingers. This eagerness pleased him, but he still didn't proceed.

"Please." I breathed, his thumb moving off my tongue and over my bottom lip.

My legs curled up and pronated in anticipation of his touch, but he sat between my knees and lightly pressed them back open.

"Say my name. Tell me what you want." He instructed, his voice low and velvet.

"Emmett, _please_." I whined.

"_Please_ what?" He insisted I articulate my desire, fire in his eyes.

One of the hardest things I ever had to do was muster enough confidence in my voice for what I was about to say.

Then, finally I said it, and asked for what I wanted.

Warmth flooded my body as he rewarded me and my breath came faster.

"Good girl." He smirked, his fingers and those divine patterns sent my body into another dimension of euphoria.

Then, he took one of my legs over his shoulder and I gasped as he pulled me in, curling his third and fourth finger to beckon me from within.

I crumbled then, the impossible pleasure of climax streaking through my body like a shooting star.

I realized how tightly I'd been holding onto him as I unclenched my fingers at my release.

The blankets of snow enveloped around us, and still pulled us into bed with one another.

I wanted it, but I couldn't say it. I still couldn't tell him I wanted...

I felt the slip of silk over my thighs as he pulled off my underwear, and I bit down on my lip to silence my reaction.

His kisses began at my inner thigh, working his way up. When his destination became clear to me, I couldn't even imagine…

But something in my body, an instinct, wanted it more than I could process.

My thoughts were scrambled and desperate, but it was a controlled burn like a candle and a flame. Nonetheless, I melted, begging him for something that had never crossed my mind before.

His... mouth...

Damn.

While his left hand was occupied, his right hand traced over my curves.

His fingers stopped their patterns, and I squirmed with anticipation of his tongue.

My body was still trembling from the last high. This, I couldn't imagine.

He peeled open my legs to give him better access, and before he ducked his head, there was a lopsided, assured smirk on his face that was seared into my memory.

The next moment would be too.

"_Holy-_" I whined at the contact.

Immediately, I transcended into another plane of existence. My limbs felt so light they could've floated away. My breath got more rapid in time with the pleasure pulsing through my veins.

I was trembling, and ecstasy was begging to swallow me once more as he proceeded.

"Again for me, Rose..." He demanded my release before returning to his task.

I sang his name then, braiding my fingers into his hair, my back arching into the stars with the glow of euphoria as he reshaped my experiences of physical intimacy and built me back from the rubble I once was.


End file.
